Scientists Found A Bizarre Planet With Three Suns

The Universe is indeed a very strange place. There is an infinite number of mysteries in the night skies, and even the explanation as to life itself is a mystery that has continued to elude us since the dawn of mankind. But somewhere out there in the vast expanse, scientists have discovered a strange planet where not one, not two, but three Suns are locked in motion and danced across its skies.  

A Three-Star System

For a celestial object that seems so important, it has a pretty uncharismatic and anti-climatic name: LTT 1445Ab. Thanks to the power of NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS), the planet was finally discovered and from what they’ve seen, this planet is out of science fiction.

In Star Wars, there was an infamous planet having a binary star system called Tatooine. In reality, LTT 1445Ab is a true three-star system that’s about 23 light-years away from Earth. It’s not the first planet ever discovered that have a three-star system, however. The first one found was a gas giant 300 light-years away.

Zero Life, But Great Potentials

If we've dreamt to travel at the speed of light, a journey to LTT 1445Ab would be pretty ‘quick’, considering it would be only 23 light-years. Even though this is a quarter of a human’s life, 23 years is like walking down a block in the galactic scale, enough for Earth and LTT 1445Ab to consider with one another neighbor.

While it would be cool to see LTT 1445Ab up close, it is nowhere near the Goldilocks zone, it orbits at a distance too close to the host star to make it feasible for life to thrive. Though it is too hot for anything to live, the sight of the three stars would be awe-inspiring. The planet itself orbits around a single host star, while the twin system of stars moves across the skies like a pair of moons.

Although it is a no for extraterrestrial life, it doesn’t mean that the planet is completely uninteresting to scientists. For example, it is only slightly larger than Earth and possibly is a rocky planet similar to ours. It’s the second closest planet we can clearly observe transiting - or passing by its host star and casting a shadow in our view to signify its presence - a star. LTT 1445Ab is also the closest planet to us that can be seen orbiting a red dwarf. The closest exoplanet, Proxima b, though was once transiting its host red dwarf host star, no longer does.

It’s an exciting prospect for scientists since transiting exoplanet gives us the opportunity to measure its atmospheric composition. This could also be an interesting experience that could help scientists in the process of searching for life in the Universe since red dwarfs are considered to be the most popular type of star.

Even though LTT 1445Ab does not give a hint of life, it could be part of the answer of whether we are truly alone in the Universe or not.