TESS spots fast super‑Earth
TESS has discovered a super‑Earth about 83 light‑years away that orbits its star in under four days and is slightly larger than Earth — a tight, ultra‑short‑period world that adds to the growing catalog of hot rocky planets. Early reports emphasize the short orbit and size but stop short of mass or atmospheric details pending follow‑up. (x.com) (x.com)
The planet is catalogued as TOI‑1080 b, orbiting a quiet M4V host at 25.6 parsecs (≈83 light‑years) with a measured orbital period of 3.9652482 +0.0000014/−0.0000015 days. (arxiv.org)) Transit modelling yields a radius of 1.200 ± 0.058 R⊕ and an equilibrium temperature of 368 +12/−10 K. (arxiv.org)) NIRPS radial‑velocity observations place a 3σ upper limit on the planet’s mass of 10.7 M⊕ (no precise mass determination reported yet). (arxiv.org)) Injection‑recovery tests in the discovery paper rule out additional transiting planets in the system down to 0.9 R⊕ for periods between 0.5 and 7.7 days, and rule out planets larger than 1.4 R⊕ for periods up to 19 days. (arxiv.org)) The discovery paper, led by Y. Gómez Maqueo Chew with a large author team, was accepted 26 February 2026 and appears in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. (arxiv.org)) The team notes TOI‑1080 b is “highly amenable” to follow‑up and scores higher than four of nine targets in the JWST+HST Rocky Worlds DDT programme, marking it as a nearby benchmark for detailed JWST observations. (arxiv.org))
