

NASA finds Earth's bigger, older cousin

(CNN) NASA said Thursday that its Kepler spacecraft has spotted \"Earth's bigger, older cousin\": the first nearly Earth-size planet to be found in the habitable zone of a star similar to our own.
Though NASA says it can't say for sure whether the planet is rocky like ours or has water and air, it's the closest match yet found.
\"Today, Earth is a little less lonely,\" Kepler researcher Jon Jenkins said.
A visitor there would experience gravity about twice that of Earth's, and planetary scientists say the odds of it having a rocky surface are \"better than even.\"
If the assumptions of planetary geologists are correct, he said, Kepler-452b could have a thicker atmosphere than Earth's, as well as active volcanoes.
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