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Space

Solar flares and cosmic rays may make Proxima b warm enough for life

By Abigail Beall

12 March 2020

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Flares from the star Proxima Centauri may warm up one of its orbiting planets enough to host life

ESO/M. Kornmesser

As it orbits the small red dwarf Proxima Centauri, an exoplanet called Proxima b is being pummelled by nearly constant stellar flares and cosmic rays. Until now, it was thought these might be damaging to potential life, but new research suggests the flares could actually help make conditions on the planet more habitable.

Markus Scheucher at the Technical University of Berlin in Germany and his colleagues modelled how incoming energetic particles from stellar…

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