Researchers with the Wisconsin Center for Origins Research have discovered their first exoplanet, a 170-million-year-old planet more than 2.5 times larger than the Earth.

It’s nearly 170 million years old. It’s more than 2.5 times the size of Earth. And it’s the first exoplanet discovered and catalogued by researchers with the Wisconsin Center for Origins Research (WiCOR).

Max Kroft, a graduate student in the lab of Assistant Professor of Astronomy Thomas Beatty, is the lead author on a paper that characterizes GJ 523b, a dense exoplanet that’s classified as a “Mega-Earth” due to its massive size. The paper is currently under review and will be available through the open-access archive arXiv.