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from https://scitechdaily.com/a-century-old-cosmic-mystery-solved-four-hidden-planets-found-near-earth/

A Century-Old Cosmic Mystery Solved – Four Hidden Planets Found Near Earth
By NASAApril 6, 2025No Comments 4 Mins Read

This artist’s concept pictures the planets orbiting Barnard’s Star, as
seen from close to the surface of one of them. Credit: International
Gemini Observatory/NOIRLab/NSF/AURA/P. Marenfeld
Astronomers have confirmed the existence of four rocky planets orbiting Barnard’s Star, our nearest solitary stellar neighbor just six
light-years away.

Using ultra-sensitive instruments, scientists detected subtle wobbles in
the star’s light caused by the gravitational pull of these tiny worlds,
each far smaller than Earth. These signals were buried under a noisy
background of stellar jitters, but through advanced modeling and precise
data analysis, researchers were able to separate the planet from the star.

A New Planetary Family Next Door
Astronomers have discovered four rocky planets, all significantly
smaller than Earth, orbiting
This artist’s concept pictures the planets orbiting Barnard’s Star, as
seen from close to the surface of one of them. Credit: International
Gemini Observatory/NOIRLab/NSF/AURA/P. Marenfeld
Astronomers have confirmed the existence of four rocky planets orbiting Barnard’s Star, our nearest solitary stellar neighbor just six
light-years away.
This artist’s concept pictures the planets orbiting Barnard’s Star, as
seen from close to the surface of one of them. Credit: International
Gemini Observatory/NOIRLab/NSF/AURA/P. Marenfeld
Astronomers have confirmed the existence of four rocky planets orbiting Barnard’s Star, our nearest solitary stellar neighbor just six
light-years away.

Using ultra-sensitive instruments, scientists detected subtle wobbles in
the star’s light caused by the gravitational pull of these tiny worlds,
each far smaller than Earth. These signals were buried under a noisy
background of stellar jitters, but through advanced modeling and precise
data analysis, researchers were able to separate the planet from the star.

A New Planetary Family Next Door
Astronomers have discovered four rocky planets, all significantly
smaller than Earth, orbiting
The new paper confirming the four tiny worlds — labeled b, c, d, and e — relies on data from MAROON-X, an “extreme precision” radial velocity instrument attached to the Gemini Telescope on the Maunakea mountaintop
in Hawaii. It confirms the detection of the “b” planet, made with
previous data from ESPRESSO, a radial velocity instrument attached to
the Very Large Telescope in Chile. And the new work reveals three new
sibling planets in the same system.

Too Hot to Host Life, but Full of Promise
These planets orbit their red dwarf star much too closely to be
habitable. The closest planet’s “year” lasts a little more than two
days; for the farthest planet, it’s is just shy of seven days. That
likely makes them too hot to support life. Yet their detection bodes
well in the search for life beyond Earth. Scientists say small, rocky
planets like ours are probably the best places to look for evidence of
life as we know it. But so far they’ve been the most difficult to detect
and characterize. High-precision radial velocity measurements, combined
with more sharply focused techniques for extracting data, could open new windows into habitable, potentially life-bearing worlds.

Barnard’s star was discovered in 1916 by Edward Emerson Barnard, a
pioneering astrophotographer.

Behind the Discovery
An international team of scientists led by Ritvik Basant of the
University of Chicago published their paper on the discovery, “Four
Sub-Earth Planets Orbiting Barnard’s Star from MAROON-X and ESPRESSO,”
in the science journal, The Astrophysical Journal Letters, in March
2025. The planets were entered into the NASA Exoplanet Archive on March
13, 2025.

Explore Further: After 100 Years of Searching, Astronomers Confirm Four
Planets at Barnard’s Star

Reference: “Four Sub-Earth Planets Orbiting Barnard’s Star from MAROON-X and ESPRESSO” by Ritvik Basant, Rafael Luque, Jacob L. Bean, Andreas Seifahrt, Madison Brady, Lily L. Zhao, Nina Brown, Tanya Das, Julian
Stürmer, David Kasper, Rohan Gupta and Guđmundur Stefánsson, 11 March
2025, The Astrophysical Journal Letters.
DOI: 10.3847/2041-8213/adb8d5

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