Now this is just über-cool. Maybe one day America will fund its space program so we could get out there. (Or at least send little Beagles and such.) (But at the rate things are going now, China will probably get there first.)
Anyway, from the BBC:
Astronomers have found the most Earth-like planet outside our Solar System to date, a world which could have water running on its surface.
The planet orbits the faint star Gliese 581, which is 20.5 light-years away in the constellation Libra
"We have estimated that the mean temperature of this 'super-Earth' lies between 0 and 40 degrees Celsius, and water would thus be liquid," explained Stephane Udry of the Geneva Observatory, lead author of the scientific paper reporting the result.
