Nasa finds group of ‘Earth-like’ planets that could host alien life using Kepler space telescope orbiting around the sun

NASA scientists have discovered ten “Earth-like” planets that could be capable of hosting alien life.

Boffins working with the ultra-powerful Kepler space telescope tracked the mysterious rocky planets that sit in the “habitual zone” of their stars.

It means that, like Earth, the planets are in the sweet spot in terms of distance from their suns, allowing life-giving liquid water to pool on the surface.

Mario Perez, Kepler program scientist at Nasa, hailed the new data as the first evidence of these “near Earth-analogs – planets with roughly the same size and orbit as Earth”.

The Kepler space telescope has been hunting for planets since it was launched into orbit around the Sun in 2009.

Of these, only 30 planets have been found to be earth-like planets potentially able to host life.

“This carefully-measured catalog is the foundation for directly answering one of astronomy’s most compelling questions – how many planets like our Earth are in the galaxy?” said Susan Thompson, Kepler research scientist.