* Astronomy

Second smallest exoplanet found to date discovered at Keck

Planet hunters using Keck Observatory have detected an extrasolar planet that is only four times the mass of Earth. The planet is the second smallest exoplanet ever discovered and adds to astronomers' growing cadre of low mass planets called super-Earths.

"This is quite a remarkable discovery. It shows that we can push down and find smaller and smaller planets" - astronomer Andrew Howard of the University of California at Berkeley.

He announced the discovery at the 215th American Astronomical Society meeting held Jan. 4-7, 2010 in Washington D.C. Dubbed HD156668b, the planet orbits its parent star in just over four days and is located roughly 80 light years from Earth in the direction of the constellation Hercules.

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Position(2000): RA 17 17 40.4898, Dec  +29 13 38.015