First Rocky Exoplanet: Kepler-10b

Kepler 10b is the name of the first confirmed rocky exoplanet, discovered using NASA's Kepler space telescope. On January 10, 2011, NASA released a press report confirming the discovery of first rocky exoplanet and named it Kepler-10b. It measures 1.4 times the size of Earth, and it is the smallest planet ever discovered outside our solar system.

• The mass is 4.6 Earth masses and it is located 560 light-years from our solar system in the Draco constellation. The estimated age is 12 Billion years.
• Kepler-10b was discovered based on eight months of data collected with the Kepler telescope from May 2009 to January 2010. This is the first that is undoubtedly rocky like Earth.
• Kepler is the first NASA mission capable of finding Earth-size planets in or near the habitable zone, the region in a planetary system where liquid water can exist on the planet's surface. However, since it orbits once every 0.84 days, Kepler-10b is more than 20 times closer to its star than Mercury is to our sun and not in the habitable zone.

Watch the Video: http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/videogallery/index.html?media_id=49589801