May Orbit Star Pair Possibility of More Similar Systems Scientists suspect a planet three times the size of Jupiter orbits a binary star system 20,000 light-years away.
Scientists hunting alien planets have a new string for their bows.
For the first time, the ability of an object's gravity to act like a lens has revealed another world, some three times more massive than Jupiter. Hunters have identified nearly two-dozen planets by studying the wobbles they impose on the motion of their parent stars toward and away from Earth. Moreover, the new planet is the first ever found orbiting two stars. Instead, their report in today's issue of Nature may lead to the discovery of a whole new cache of planets never before seen. Astronomers have used gravitational lensing for decades in galactic research.