Harvard’s Research for TOI 700 d
The planet TOI 700 d is the outermost planet in the star system, as well as the only one in the habitable zone. It measures 20% more than the Earth, circles every 37 days, as well as receives from Itoi 700 d almost 86% of the energy received by Earth from the sun. It is believed that these three planets are tidally locked to the star, which implies all of them rotate once during one orbit. It means that one side of these planets is continuously facing the daylight.
Joseph Rodriguez, one of the astronomers at the Center for Astrophysics at Harvard & Smithsonian in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and his team of scientists requested follow-up monitoring with Spitzer telescope to confirm the planet TIO 700 d. Rodriguez said that given the magnitude of the discovery, that TOI 700’s third planet is the first habitable zone by TESS, the team wanted their understanding of the system to be as stable as possible. He added that Spitzer saw the planet transit at the exact time they had expected it to. He called this an impactful addition to the mission’s legacy that helped affirm two of TRAPPIST-1 planets as well as identify five more.