Teegarden's Star b
A once top-ranked Earth-like exoplanet around a nearby red dwarf.
Teegarden's Star b is a planet that orbits a red dwarf star called Teegarden's Star, located 12.5 light-years from our Solar System. It sits within the star's habitable zone. For a time, it had the highest Earth Similarity Index ever recorded for an exoplanet, but a study from February 2024 adjusted its characteristics, lowering that score. Even so, together with its sibling planet Teegarden's Star c, it is still one of the nearest known exoplanets that might be capable of supporting life.
Quick Facts
- Discoverer
- Zechmeister et al.
- Discovery site
- Calar Alto Observatory
- Discovered
- June 2019
- Star
- Teegarden's Star
- Single temperature
- 301 K
Facts from the source article.
Did You Know?
- Teegarden's Star was only discovered in 2003 because of its low apparent magnitude of 15.1.
- The star emits most of its energy in the infrared spectrum, like most red and brown dwarfs.
- Teegarden's Star has an age of at least 8 billion years, making it older than the Sun.
Discovery
In July 2019, a team of over 155 scientists led by Mathias Zechmeister published a peer-reviewed article in Astronomy & Astrophysics as part of the CARMENES survey supporting two candidate exoplanets around Teegarden's Star. Because the star is faint and aligned unfavorably, Doppler spectroscopy was required to detect planets indirectly via radial velocity shifts. Using the CARMENES instrument on the 3.5 m telescope at Spain's Calar Alto Observatory, three years of observation revealed two periodic radial velocity signals, one corresponding to Teegarden's Star b.
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