Earth-sized planet found in its star system's habitable zone

Astronomers have discovered a world only a little bit bigger than Earth that orbits in a nearby star’s habitable zone — the region in which liquid water could exist. Astronomers have identified only a handful of such exoplanets. The world orbits a star about 31 parsecs from our planet, and is the first such body to be discovered by NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite, which launched in 2018. Although the world is similar in size to Earth — and could be rocky — astronomers say it is likely to be very different from our planet because the light in which it is bathed is fainter.