另一个地球 (ling yige diqiu): Another earth

NASA announced on Thursday that its Kepler space telescope had found the most Earth-like planet yet.

The newly-discovered planet, named Kepler-452b, is about 60 percent larger than our planet. It is located in the constellation Cygnus, which is 1,400 light years away from earth. The planet is circling a star that is very similar to the sun, although older.

The planet is one of 500 possible planets sighted by the Kepler space telescope around distant stars. Twelve of them are less than twice Earth's diameter and orbiting in the so-called habitable zone around their star.

Kepler-452b is positioned about as far from its parent star as Earth is from the sun, completing an orbit in 385 days. At that distance, it might be cool enough to host liquid water on its surface and therefore life.

NASA launched the Kepler telescope in 2009 to survey a sampling of nearby stars in an attempt to learn if Earth-like planets were common in the galaxy.