October 20, 2009--A gas giant planet called HD 209458b, seen above in an artist's conception, is now the second so-called hot Jupiter found to have the basic chemistry for life.

Astronomers using the Hubble Space Telescope and Spitzer Space Telescope announced on Tuesday that they have found traces of water, methane, and carbon dioxide on the distant world, which orbits a sunlike star about 150 light-years away.

The discovery comes almost a year after the same team had announced the first ever detection of carbon dioxide in a planet outside our solar system.