Orbital Differences Between Earth and Proxima Centauri b

  • Released Thursday, January 23rd, 2020
  • Updated Wednesday, November 15th, 2023 at 12:14AM
  • ID: 4779

Proxima Centauri b is the closest exoplanet to Earth. It is only four light years away. It's star is a red dwarf that is much smaller than our Sun. However, it is much closer to its star than Earth is to the Sun. It also orbits around it's star at a much faster rate than Earth.

Background image comparing the relative sizes of our Sun to Proxima B's star. Proxima Centauri's radius is approximately 7 times smaller than our Sun's radius.



Credits

Please give credit for this item to:
NASA's Scientific Visualization Studio


Papers used in this visualization

https://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2017arXiv170902051D/abstract