Year-ender: Historical human breakthroughs in 2019

Humanity's first nearby super-Earth discovered

NASA's Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS), a mission designed to comb the heavens for exoplanets, has discovered its first potentially habitable world outside the solar system.

In a new paper in The Astrophysical Journal Letters, a team led by Lisa Kaltenegger, associate professor of astronomy and director of Cornell's Carl Sagan Institute, models the conditions under which the planet -- discovered in early 2019 -- could sustain life.

"This is exciting, as this is humanity's first nearby super-Earth that could harbor life -- uncovered with help from TESS, our small, mighty mission with a huge reach," said Kaltenegger.

As this super-Earth exoplanet is more massive than earth, Kaltenegger said this discovery will provide insight into Earth's heavyweight planetary cousins.