The first rocky planet ever spotted orbiting a burned out star called a white dwarf offers a glimpse of what may be in store for Earth billions of years from now - showing it is possible our planet might survive the death of the sun,

The red giant phase is pretty crazy. The star's outer atmosphere can expand to hundreds of times its initial size; some projections of the Sun's future – due to start becoming a red giant in about 5 billion years or so – predict it could grow as large as out to the orbit of Mars, engulfing Mercury, Venus, and Earth in the process.

An international team of astronomers reports the discovery of a new extrasolar world orbiting a nearby star known as HD 86728. This is the first exoplanet detection made as part of the NEID Earth Twin Survey (NETS).

The search for a second Earth within the Milky Way is ongoing, but a recently discovered planet falls short of the mark.