The method is a lot like tracing the ripples made by a rock thrown in a pond.
Cloud-free exoplanet provides best evidence of sodium in planets outside our solar system so far
A cloudless exoplanet has become a benchmark for astronomers to gauge sodium content in alien worlds.
Astronomers find helium in exoplanet’s atmosphere for the first time
It took abnormally look considering helium is the 2nd most abundant element in the universe.
Kepler — the spacecraft that discovered thousands of alien worlds — is running on its last drops of fuel
It will have time to find just a couple more candidate exoplanets.
15 new planets discovered — one is potentially habitable
Three of the newly-discovered planets are so-called super-Earths.
Hunt for planets through Kepler’s data with this newly released Google code
Space exploration made easy.
Astronomers find unique water-rich exoplanet similar in mass with Saturn
This odd world hundreds of light-years away could teach us about how planets in our solar system formed.
New Earth-sized exoplanet found nearby might be ‘comfy’ enough for life
Who knows — this might make a great second home.
Evidence keeps pilling up in favor of the mysterious Planet Nine
A ninth planet 10 times bigger than Earth might be lurking far away within the solar system.
Revolutionary optical upgrade enables ground-based telescopes to hunt for alien planets
This could be a game changer.
Odd Jupiter-sized exoplanet is hot enough to melt metal but paradoxically pitch-black
It’s the ‘blackest’ planet we’ve found.
Scientists may have found the first exomoon. It looks like it’s the size of Neptune
It’s the best candidate for an alien moon we’ve encountered so far.
Scorching exoplanet is hotter than most stars. It’s so hot it might even leave a trail of atomic gas like a comet
That’s one hot tomato!
Puffy exoplanet is as dense as styrofoam. The unusual find could help find habitable alien planets
An extraordinarily inflated planet could prove very lucrative in our quest to find other habitable planets.
NASA finds 7 Earth-sized planets in a star nearby. Three are in the habitable zone
What a great day for science!
Tomorrow, NASA will announce major “discovery beyond the solar system” during press conference
It’s press only, but NASA made sure everyone can follow the talks and even get a question in.
You can search for your own exoplanets — Researchers make huge dataset available
The search for extraterrestrial life is about to get some new recruits — us.
Astronomers shoot incredible image of Jupiter-sized alien planet and its parent star 1,200 light-years away
A glimpse from outer space.
Mysterious Planet 9 that’s hiding somewhere in our solar system might be stolen from another star
One group from Lund University in Sweden says Planet 9 or Planet X, as it’s sometimes called, might actually be an exoplanet, initially formed in another solar system but captured by our sun in an interstellar gravity tug of war.
What makes a planet? Finally a simple formula that includes exoplanets as well
There is only one clear set of official criteria by which we class or not a cosmic body as a planet. These criteria introduced in 2006 by the International Astronomical Union saw Pluto demoted to the status of dwarf planet. Oddly enough, though, these rules were made for classing planets only in our solar system, meaning the 5,000 exoplanets (what should be planets outside our solar system) identified so far are now in a “definitional limbo,” according to planetary astronomer Jean-Luc Margot at UCLA. Luckily, Margot has come up with a solution which seems to work marvelously.