Trekkie news traveling at warp speed: University of Texas astronomer WILLIAM COCHRAN has discovered a Jupiter-size planet in the same orbit that Star Trek lore says you would find Vulcan, MR. SPOCK'S home world. That would be somewhere orbiting the star Epsilon Eridani, just a hop, skip and parsec from Earth, or 10.5 light-years to be exact.
Epsilon Eridani was never mentioned on the 1960s TV series or in the six movies that featured the science officer played by LEONARD NIMOY--indeed, producer GENE RODDENBERRY said in 1991 that the star he envisioned was 40 Eridani, which is 4 billion years old....