Kepler-47 – the first multiplanet circumbinary star system

This is just a very quite post to mention that our paper on the first multiplanet circumbinary system was published online today in Science. Basically what we have found is two stars orbiting each other and two planets orbiting around the outside of these two stars. This is in some ways similar to the Pluto-Charon system in the outer solar system which hosts four smaller bodies (in the case of Pluto they are moons) in addition to Pluto and Charon.

One of the planets may be in the habitable zone. However, both are very likely not rocky and so will not suport life as we know it.

Amazingly this paper was written in a couple of weeks, was submitted on Aug 3 and published Aug 28. This is the fastest I have ever heard of a paper being published by any journal.