Extrasolar Planets
Small Telescope Finds a Huge Planet
Planet hunting has traditionally only been possible with very large telescopes, capable of detecting tiny changes around distant stars which…
The Search for More Earths
When astronomers first realized that the stars in the sky were like our Sun, only more distant, they wondered if…
Observatory Finds Its First Planet
The McDonald Observatory's Hobby-Eberly Telescope has found its first extrasolar planet. The planet is 2.84 times of the mass of…
Asteroids Make Tau Ceti Lethal
Astronomers have found that a nearby star, Tau Ceti, is surrounded by 10 times as many asteroids and comets as…
Spitzer Finds Youngest Planet
NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope has peered through the dusty haze into the construction zones for new planets and found organic…
Two Planet Finding Missions
One of the big goals of astronomy is to answer the question: are we alone? In order to find out…
Two Hot Planets Seen Orbiting Very Close to Parent Stars
European astronomers have confirmed a new class of objects, known as "very hot Jupiters", which are large, extremely hot, and…
Gravitational Lens Reveals Distant Planet
Astronomers have watched how the gravity of a star bends the light from a more distant star to discover a…
How Many Habitable Earths Are Out There?
Although more than 100 planetary systems have been discovered, astronomers have only found large, Jupiter-sized planets. The real prize will…
Look for Dust to Find New Earths
Instead of looking directly for Earth-sized planets, it might be easier to just try to find the ring of dust…