A rocky 'super- Earth' have been spotted orbiting one of the Milky Way's oldest stars!

 In  a recent study, it has been discovered that there exists a hot and rocky exoplanet known as super-Earth. This planet in the Milky Way galaxy and is believed to be orbiting around one of the oldest stars in the galaxy.

Earlier this week, a team of researchers announced the discovery of TOI-561b, a rocky exoplanet that's been deemed a 'super-Earth'. It's located about 280 light-years away. The exoplanet gets its title as it is suspected to be around three times the mass of Earth and is about 50 per cent larger than Earth but have density similar to Earth. It only takes less than half an Earth day to complete one orbit around its host star.

"For every day you're on Earth, this planet orbits its star twice", said Stephen Kane, study co-author and astrophysicist at the University of California, Riverside, in a statement, according to the report published in CNN.

Astronomers, however, were surprised to discover that despite the planet's mass, its density is about the same as that of Earth.

"This is surprising because you'd expect the density to be higher", Kane said. "This is consistent with the notion that the notion that the planet is extremely old".

Older planets are actually less dense because there weren't as many heavy elements present in the universe when these planets formed. Heavy elements are created as stars age and explode, which seeds the creation of new stars and planets across the universe.

The planet is far too hot to sustain any type of life (that we know about). This super-Earth likely has an average surface temperature on the planet exceeding 2,000 kelvin or 3,140 degree Fahrenheit.

The planet was discovered using NASA's planet-hunting TESS mission which was launched in 2018. The name 'TESS' is stands for Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite. The mission regularly surveys parts of the sky and observes nearby stars to determine if there are planets orbiting them.

"TOI-561b is one of the oldest rocky planet yet discovered", said lead study author Lauren Weiss in a statement. "Its existence shows that the universe has been forming rocky planets almost since its inception 14 billion years ago". In comparison, our sun is only 4.5 billion years old.

"This planet formed at a time when majority of stars in our galaxy were first beginning to shine", Weiss said at the conference.