A newly discovered exoplanet has a lot of astronomers excited, and for good reason.
The exoplanet, dubbed GJ 1132b, is about the size of Earth and lives in a solar system roughly 39 light-years from Earth, a team of scientists reported in the November 12, 2015, issue of the journal Nature.
Furthermore, the exoplanet is the closest rocky Earth-sized exoplanet ever discovered, by far.
The next closest is about three times farther away.
GJ 1132b's size and distance are what have astronomers like Drake Deming at the University of Maryland — who was not part of the study — saying that this planet is "arguably the most important planet ever found outside the solar system," he told The Guardian.
The reason is because GJ 1132b is close enough for astronomers to point their telescopes at it and sniff out any traces of an atmosphere.
Studying the atmospheres of exoplanets for signs of life is the next big step in the search for extraterrestrial life beyond our solar system.
But it's an extremely difficult project because most Earth-sized planets — the exoplanets that astrobiologists think are most likely to harbor life — are too distant to study in any detail.
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