Lonely 'homeless' planet found for the first time Although scientists have known this type of "homeless" planet existed, they have not been able to observe one until now. It is believed the isolated planet could have been flung away from other bodies during its formation. It is hoped it will now allow astronomers a greater understanding of both freefalling planets and exoplanets, which do orbit stars. Its very existence already supports theories that this type of "homeless" object is more common in space than currently thought. "Although theorists had established the existence of this type of very cold and young planet, one had never been observed until today," said Étienne Artigau, an astrophysicist at UdeM. This object was discovered during a scan that covered the equivalent of 1000 times the surface of the full moon. We observed hundreds of millions of stars and planets, but we only found one homeless planet in our neighbourhood. Now we will be looking for them amongst an astronomical number of sources further afield. It's like looking for a single needle in amongst thousands of haystacks. The team of astronomers have finally been able to study it due to its comparative proximity, and the absence of a bright star very close to it. "Looking for planets around their stars is akin to studying a firefly sitting one centimetre away from a distant, powerful car headlight," says Philippe Delorme, lead author from the Institut de planetologie et d'astrophysique de Grenoble, France. This nearby free-floating object offered the opportunity to study the firefly in detail without the dazzling lights of the car messing everything up. Jonathan Gagné, doctoral student of physics at UdeM, added: "Over the past few years, several objects of this type have been identified, but their existence could not be established without scientific confirmation of their age. Astronomers weren't sure whether to categorize them as planets or as Brown dwarfs. Brown dwarfs are what we could call failed stars, as they never manage to initiate nuclear reactions in their centres. The word "planet" originates from the Latin planetus, which originally comes from the Greek words planeta or planêtês, meaning moving or wandering celestial bodies. The definition differentiates them from stars, which appear to be in a fixed position in the sky.