First Possible Planet , Outside of Our Galaxy, Discovered by NASA.
In a press release on Oct. 25,
NASA said the possible
exoplanet was detected by
the Chandra X-ray Observatory.
It is located in the Whirlpool Galaxy,
also known as Messier 51 (M51).
Previously, all other exoplanets have been found in the Milky Way Galaxy and are usually less than 3,000 light-years from Earth.
The new discovery is about
28 million light-years from Earth.
We are trying to open up a whole new arena for finding other worlds by searching for planet candidates at X-ray wavelengths, a strategy that makes it possible to discover them in other galaxies, Rosanne Di Stefano, study lead, lecturer instructor in astronomy at the Center for Astrophysics at the Harvard & Smithsonian in Cambridge, Massachusetts, via statement.
But researchers won't be able to confirm their findings for another 70 years due to the object's large orbit.
Unfortunately to confirm that we're seeing a planet we would likely have to wait decades to see another transit. And because of the uncertainties about how long it takes to orbit, we wouldn't know exactly when to look, Nia Imara, study co-author, astrophysicist at the
University of California at Santa Cruz, via statement.
Researchers will continue to search for more exoplanet candidates in other galaxies by utilizing the archives of Chandra and the European Space Agency satellite XMM-Newton