A super Earth discovered 42 light years away from us

Astronomers have discovered a new planet similar to earth in water consistency but its  size is larger than earth. The planet is supposed to be half covered with water. According to the study by the Harvard Smithsonian Centre for Astrophysics, the planet orbits every 38 hours around a small, faint star that was first spotted by eight ground based telescopes not larger than those used by amateur astronomers. The newly discovered planet is considered as “Super Earth” because of its huge size and is about 42 light years away in another solar system. It has a radius nearly 2.7 times larger than our earth.
Geoffrey Marcy from University of California told that this is an important discovery towards search of similar planet like Earth. The discovery is named GJ 1214b.  Harvard Smithsonian Centre for Astrophysics informed in a statement that the new found world is believed to be very hot to sustain life. The temperature of the ocean surface is around 200 degree celsius and the atmosphere is probably cloaked in a dark fog of superheated steam and other gases.
The density of the planet hints that the planet is composed of about three fourths of water and other ices and one fourth rock. Atmospheric temperature is estimated to be between 280 and 120 degrees Celsius. The interesting estimation is that the center star around which the planet is revolving is about one fifth the size of the Sun.
A graduate student who are among those who first spotted the planet's presence guessed that despite hot temperature of the planet, it appears to be a waterworld. He said that it is more similar to earth than any other exoplanet discovered so far. Some of the water is in crystalline form that may form at pressures which is greater than 20,000 times Earth's sea level atmosphere.

The scientists talk about a similar discovery named CoRoT-7b, which revolves around a star but is much hotter. The CoRoT-7b has a density of 5.5 grammes per cubic centimeter which is close to be that of Earth and appears rocky.
The new planet discovered is estimated to have density of 1.9 g/cm3 which is much lesser than earth.
A researcher said that such a less density is only possible when planet contains large amounts of water. The planet must contain water 50% of its mass.
Attempts are being made to determine the atmosphere of new planet. Head of the research team David Charbonneau guessed that atmosphere is not hospitable to support life.