A super-Earth that could explain the universe's mysterious lack of certain exoplanets has been found by NASA's Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) and the planet-measuring ESPRESSO instrument on the Very Large Telescope in Chile.

"It's a small addition to the already long list of known planets, but such discoveries are essential to improve our understanding of the mechanisms of planet formation and evolution," said José Rodrigues of the Porto Institute of Astrophysics, who led the study, in a statement. "Many more [planets] will be needed to transform our hypotheses into scientific certainties."