As far as we know, Earth is pretty special. Scientists have found more than 3,200 distant planets, but none are quite as conducive to life as ours.
2016-06-17
Some have the potential to be, though, falling in a "Goldilocks" habitable zone: where water could be liquid.
The most promising of these worlds are small, rocky bodies that orbit their star (or stars) at a distance similar to Earth's from the sun.
Below are the top nine exoplanets that scientists at the Planetary Habitability Laboratory think might support human (or maybe even alien) life.
They're all ranked by their Earth Similarity Index (ESI) — a shortcut to assessing a world's "Earthiness," with 0.0 being a hellish gas giant, 0.7 being a Mars, and 1.0 being a near-copy of our home planet.
9) GJ 667 C e is a super Earth that has a 62-day orbit.
An artist's depiction of what the sunsets would look like on the three potentially habitable planets orbiting the star Gliese 667C.
NASA
Exoplanets don't have the catchiest of names. They typically get their title based on the star they orbit (in this case Gliese 667C). Each exoplanet that orbits the star gets a letter, which in this case is "e," for the fifth planet scientists discovered there.
1) GJ 667 C c is the third habitable planet orbiting Gliese. So far it's the most Earth-like world we know of, though we'd have to travel a very long way to find out.
An artist's depiction of what the sunsets would look like on the three potentially habitable planets orbiting the star Gliese 667C.
PHL @ UPR Arecibo
Rebecca was an Executive Editor for Business Insider's news division, overseeing the Science, Speed news, Weekend news, LA news, Visual Features, and Voices of Color desks. She worked across teams to assign, coordinate, and edit breaking news, explainers, features, analysis, and investigations. She also developed guides, trainings, and coaching opportunities for the newsroom to get better every day.Rebecca started as a reporter on Tech Insider's science section in 2015, covering everything from solar energy and rocket launches to Zika, before moving to the news team during the summer of 2016 at the height of the presidential election and then running weekend coverage for 2 years. She's previously worked with the Politics, Military & Defense, and Video teams, and served as an editorial liaison with the product team that powers the CMS.She received her Master's degree from the Science, Health and Environmental Reporting Program at New York University, as well as a BS in Biology and a BA in Journalism from the University of Minnesota. Rebecca has also written for Popular Science, Scientific American, Scienceline, the Minneapolis Star Tribune, and the Minnesota Daily.ExpertiseBreaking news, legal analysis, criminal justice, police misconduct, public health, abortion, space, energy, visual features, extreme weather, White House history, voting rights, executive actionsPopular articlesJust don't call it 'climate change': What Republicans in Dallas can teach us about saving the planetWhat Buzz Aldrin was thinking when he left the moonHow the 25th Amendment works to remove a sitting presidentHurricane categories tell only part of the storyTRUMP'S FIRST 100 DAYS: Here's how they compare with Obama's, Bush's, and Clinton's
