Illustration of a Planet the Size of Earth with a ‘Tatooine’ Appearance

Luke Skywalker’s home planet Tatooine in “Star Wars” is depicted as a dry, sandy desert world with two suns in its sky. However, scientific observations from NASA’s Kepler space telescope have shown that planets can exist in double-star systems, although the ones discovered so far are typically large and gaseous. This led scientists to wonder if an Earth-size planet orbiting two suns could potentially support life.

Recent research published in the journal Nature Communications suggests that such a planet could indeed be habitable, especially if it is located at the right distance from its two stars. Contrary to popular belief, it may not even have deserts. The study indicates that within a specific range of distances from two sun-like host stars, a planet covered in water could remain habitable and retain its water for an extended period.

To illustrate this concept, scientists conducted simulations using the binary star system Kepler-35A and B. Although the actual system hosts a giant planet called Kepler-35b, which is about eight times the size of Earth, the researchers focused on a hypothetical scenario. They added an Earth-size planet covered in water to the Kepler-35 A and B stars and analyzed how its climate would behave as it orbited the host stars within periods ranging from 341 to 380 days.

This article is republished from PhysORG under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.