Skip Navigation
menu close modal

Multimedia

The Earth-like Planet Gliese 581c (Artist's Impression)

The Earth-like Planet Gliese 581c (Artist's Impression)

Artist's impression of the five-Earth mass planet, Gliese 581 c, found in the habitable zone around the red dwarf Gliese 581, with the instrument HARPS on the ESO 3.6-m telescope.

Credit

ESO

ENLARGE

Related

While there is much debate over which exoplanet discovery is considered the "first," one stands out from the rest. In 1995, scientists discovered 51 Pegasi b, forever changing the way we see the un...
More
Greetings from your First Exoplanet
Greetings from your First Exoplanet
The first discovery of an Earth-size planet in the habitable zones of another star meant planets other than Earth may have liquid water on their surface.
More
Infographic: Planet Kepler-186f, trailblazer
Infographic: Planet Kepler-186f, trailblazer
This plot of data from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope tells astronomers that a toasty gas exoplanet, or a planet beyond our solar system, contains water vapor.
More
Exoplanet Forecast: Hot and Wet
Exoplanet Forecast: Hot and Wet
Planets having atmospheres rich in helium may be common in our galaxy, according to a new theory based on data from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope. These planets would be around the mass of Neptune...
More
Helium-Shrouded Planets (Artist's Concept)
Helium-Shrouded Planets (Artist's Concept)
Located less than 32 light-years from Earth, AU Microscopii is among the youngest planetary systems ever observed by astronomers, and its star throws vicious temper tantrums!
More
Giant flares from a giant, bright young star in oranges, reds and bright yellow burst from the star, affecting a nearby planet. You can see the planet’s atmosphere being blasted away by the energy.
Flares of Fury Poster
The basic chemistry for life has been detected in a second hot gas planet, HD 209458b, depicted in this artist's concept.
More
Exotic Atmospheres
Exotic Atmospheres
For the first time since exoplanets, or planets around stars other than the sun, were discovered almost 20 years ago, X-ray observations have detected an exoplanet passing in front of its parent st...
More
Exo-eclipse in x-ray vision
Exo-eclipse in x-ray vision
This artist's conception compares the KOI-961 planetary system to Jupiter and the largest four of its many moons. Image credit: Caltech
More
KOI-961 and its three known planets
KOI-961 and its three known planets
This infrared data from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope called a spectrum tells astronomers that a distant gas planet, a so-called "hot Jupiter" called HD 209458b, might be smothered with high cloud...
More
Cracking the Code of Faraway Worlds: an Exoplanet Atmosphere
Cracking the Code of Faraway Worlds: an Exoplanet Atmosphere
Do other planets beyond our solar system, called exoplanets, also host life forms?
More
In the Zone: How Scientists Search for Habitable Planets
In the Zone: How Scientists Search for Habitable Planets
This image from NASA's Kepler spacecraft shows the telescope's field of view taken in a new demonstration mode in late October. A new mission concept, dubbed K2, would continue Kepler's search for ...
More
NASA Kepler's Second Light
NASA Kepler's Second Light
This artist's concept illustrates a young, red dwarf star surrounded by three planets.
More
Planets Under a Red Sun
Planets Under a Red Sun
Artist’s rendition of the relationship between the composition of the atmosphere and transmitted colors of light.
More
Rayleigh scattering in exoplanet atmospheres
Rayleigh scattering in exoplanet atmospheres
This artist's conception illustrates a Jupiter-like planet alone in the dark of space, floating freely without a parent star.
More
Free-Floating Planets May be More Common Than Stars
Free-Floating Planets May be More Common Than Stars
This artist's illustration gives an impression of how common planets are around the stars in the Milky Way.
More
Planets everywhere
Planets everywhere
In the depths of the universe, the cores of two collapsed stars violently merge to release a burst of the deadliest and most powerful form of light, known as gamma rays.
More
Two astronauts are standing on an asteroid, watching a pair of neutron stars, or the cores of collapsed stars, collide in the distance. The result of the collision is bright, concentrated beams of light called gamma rays. The gamma ray bursts narrowly miss the astronauts as they shoot outward from the collision.
Gamma Ray Ghouls
This is an artist's concept of HD 189733b and its parent star.
More
Extrasolar Planet's Hazy Atmosphere (Artist's Concept)
Extrasolar Planet's Hazy Atmosphere (Artist's Concept)
This artist's conception shows the object named WISE J085510.83-071442.5, the coldest known brown dwarf. Brown dwarfs are dim star-like bodies that lack the mass to burn nuclear fuel as stars do.
More
Cold and Close Celestial Orb (Artist's Concept)
Cold and Close Celestial Orb (Artist's Concept)
This plot of data from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope indicates the presence of molecules in the planet WASP-12b -- a super-hot gas giant that orbits tightly around its star.
More
Signature of a Carbon-Rich Planet
Signature of a Carbon-Rich Planet
Astronomers using NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope have detected what they believe is an alien world just two-thirds the size of Earth one of the smallest on record.
More
Exoplanet is Extremely Hot and Incredibly Close (Artist's Concept)
Exoplanet is Extremely Hot and Incredibly Close (Artist's Concept)
For Valentine's Day, give the tight-knit Kepler-11 to your faves.
More
An illustration of an exoplanet Valentine.
Planetary System Valentine
These doomed worlds were among the first and creepiest to be discovered. They orbit an undead star known as a pulsar. 
More
A poster done in the style of movie posters from the 1950s and 1960s showing the zombie worlds with a colorful nebula and a planet being blasted by twin beams of radiation by the pulsar host star. The overall image creates the look of a scary skull.
Zombie Worlds Poster
This image from NASA's Kepler mission shows the telescope's full field of view -- an expansive star-rich patch of sky in the constellations Cygnus and Lyra.
More
Two Zooms in the Kepler Field
Two Zooms in the Kepler Field
Artist's impression of the planetary system around the red dwarf Gliese 581.
More
The Planetary System in Gliese 581 (artist's impression)
The Planetary System in Gliese 581 (artist's impression)
A whole new category of planets, Super Earths are quite common in our galaxy.
More
Super Earth—Super Girth
Super Earth—Super Girth

Explore Alien Worlds

Exoplanet Travel Bureau

This set of travel posters envision a day when the creativity of scientists and engineers will allow us to do things we can only dream of now.
More

Strange New Worlds

Explore an interactive gallery of some of the most intriguing and exotic planets discovered so far.
More
A planetary tour through time. The ancients debated the existence of planets beyond our own; now we know of thousands.

Historic Timeline

A planetary tour through time. The ancients debated the existence of planets beyond our own; now we know of thousands.
More