More Exoplanets Discovered Around Gliese 667

This picture shows the sky around multiple star Gliese 667. The bright star at the center is Gliese 667 A and B, the two main components of the system, which cannot be separated in this image. Gliese 667C, the third component, is visible as a bright star, very close and just under A and B, still in the glare of these brighter stars. The very subtle wobbles of Gliese 667C, measured with high precision spectrographs including HARPS, revealed it is surrounded by a full planetary system, with up to seven planets.

Note that this image was assembled from two photographic plates taken years apart through different colored filters. During that time, the motion of the nearby stars Gliese 667AB and C was sufficient for them to appear doubled in this picture, with one red and one blue image of each star.

This picture also shows two regions of star formation, much further from Earth than Gliese 667. At the upper-left NGC 6357 is visible and towards the bottom of the picture NGC 6334 (The Cat’s Paw Nebula).

Photo credit: ESO

Note: For more information, see Three Planets in Habitable Zone of Nearby Star.

Super-Earth Gliese 667 Cc

This artist’s impression shows a sunset seen from the super-Earth Gliese 667 Cc. The brightest star in the sky is the red dwarf Gliese 667 C, which is part of a triple star system. The other two more distant stars, Gliese 667 A and B appear in the sky also to the right. Astronomers have estimated that there are tens of billions of such rocky worlds orbiting faint red dwarf stars in the Milky Way alone.

Illustration credit: ESO/L. Calçada

Note: For more information, see Many Billions of Rocky Planets in the Habitable Zones around Red Dwarfs in the Milky Way.