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Space
Space
Science
Keith Cooper

A hidden 'super-Earth' exoplanet is dipping in and out of its habitable zone

A super-Earth basks in the glow of its star in this artist's impression. Is the world habitable and Earth-like with a watery atmosphere, or is it Neptune-esque, swathed in hydrogen and helium?.

A huge "super-Earth" with an extreme climate that results in it being habitable for only part of its orbit has been discovered orbiting a star 2,472 light years away. And the most remarkable thing is, it was discovered without even being directly detected.

The discovery of the exoplanet, a super-Earth called Kepler-735c, is all down to something called transit timing variations, or TTVs for short.

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