Astronomers say that in our galaxy in about one sixth star has a size close to Earth that it brings the number to a total of 17 billion This result was obtained on the basis of data analysis of the planets of the candidates collected by the telescope "Kepler".

The results were announced at two hundred twenty-first meeting of the American astronomical society in California.

Since its launch into orbit in 2009, "Kepler" has studied only a certain, fixed part of the sky, with more than 150,000 stars in his field of vision. He discovers the planet due to the interruption of the flow of light coming from a star when a planet passes in front of her. But this complicates the measurement, so the light at this distance varies only a tiny fraction of a percent, and not every such termination occurs because of the passage of the planet in front of the star.

Of all detected "Kepler" planets, 10, according to the scientists, are in the "habitable zone"that could potentially allow the formation of liquid water on their surfaces.