Record 5th planet found around nearby star

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An artists concept of the star 55 Cancri showing the newly discovered planet in the foreground  a gas giant half the mass of Saturn  and three already known inner planets (the planet farthest from the star is not pictured). All the inner planets are  ...
An artist's concept of the star 55 Cancri showing the newly discovered planet in the foreground – a gas giant half the mass of Saturn – and three already known inner planets (the planet farthest from the star is not pictured). All the inner planets are the size of Neptune or bigger, unlike our solar system's rocky inner planets. The colors of the planets in this illustration were chosen to resemble those of our own solar system. Astronomers do not know what the planets look like. (NASA/JPL-Caltech)
A team of American astronomers announced today (Tuesday, Nov. 6) the discovery of a record-breaking fifth planet around the nearby star 55 Cancri, making it the only star aside from the sun known to have five planets.


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All News summaries for November 06, 2007