"It’s a really exciting find — Barnard’s Star is our cosmic neighbor, and yet we know so little about it," Ritvik Basant, an exoplanet researcher at the University of Chicago who led the research, said in a statement. "It’s signaling a breakthrough with the precision of these new instruments from previous generations."

Astronomers have revealed new evidence that there are not just one but four tiny planets circling around Barnard's Star, the second-nearest star system to Earth.The four planets, each only about 20 to 30% the mass of Earth,

Exciting new research suggests there are four miniature planets orbiting Barnard’s Star, each thought to be just 20 to 30% the mass of Earth.