The search for E.T. makes a little more progress today with the announcement by British astronomers that they’ve discovered another solar system similar to our own floating around out there in space:
Wired News: Alien Solar System Much Like Ours
Our solar system just got a little less special, to the delight of those hoping to find life elsewhere in the galaxy.
British astronomers say they found the first sun-like star with a giant gas planet in an orbit similar to Jupiter’s, which leaves plenty of room for worlds like Earth and Mars.
The discovery “moves this star to No. 1 on the list” of places to look for a planet like Earth, said astrophysicist Hugh Jones of Liverpool John Moores University, who led the team that made the discovery. The team announced the find on Thursday at a conference on extra-solar planets in Paris.
Don’t get too excited about having any close encounters of the alien kind anytime soon, though, the article notes that this new solar system is “just” 90 light years away. Even travelling at the speed of light the trip would take longer than the average human life span.
Posted on 07/08/2003 at 01:37 PM 
I meant to blog this one, myself. Tres cool, eh?