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Increasing the Odds of the Sweep

Increasing the Odds of the Sweep

Artist's impression of a transiting Jupiter-mass exoplanet around a star slightly more massive than the Sun, such as the one discovered around SWEEPS-04.

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ESO

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Astronomers using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) have taken the first ever image of the snow line in an infant planetary system.
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ALMA image of the carbon monoxide snow line around TW Hydrae
ALMA image of the carbon monoxide snow line around TW Hydrae
Kepler-7b (left), which is 1.5 times the radius of Jupiter (right), is the first exoplanet to have its clouds mapped. This artist's concept shows what those clouds might look like. The cloud map was produced using data from NASA's Kepler and Spitzer space telescopes.
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Partially Cloudy Skies on Kepler-7b (Artist's Concept)
Partially Cloudy Skies on Kepler-7b (Artist's Concept)
This graph of data from NASA's Spitzer Space telescope shows changes in the infrared light output of two star-planet systems (one above, one below) located hundreds of light-years away.
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The Language of Planetary Light
The Language of Planetary Light
This shows the first planet to be confirmed as an exoplanet, 51 Pegasi b, and the newest Earth-sized planet confirmed.
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Twenty Years of Progress
Twenty Years of Progress
This image shows the HR 8799 planets with starlight optically suppressed and data processing conducted to remove residual starlight. The star is at the center of the blackened circle in the image. The four spots indicated with the letters b through e are the planets. This is a composite image using 30 wavelengths of light and was obtained over a period of 1.25 hours on June 14 and 15, 2012.
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Planetary Family Portrait
Planetary Family Portrait
This artist's concept illustrates two planetary systems -- 55 Cancri (top) and our own. Blue lines show the orbits of planets, including the dwarf planet Pluto in our solar system.
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Our Solar System's Cousin?
Our Solar System's Cousin?
This image from the NACO system on ESO’s Very Large Telescope shows a candidate protoplanet in the disc of gas and dust around the young star HD100546.
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VLT image of the protoplanet around the young star HD 100546
VLT image of the protoplanet around the young star HD 100546
This artist’s impression shows the formation of a gas giant planet in the ring of dust around the young star HD 100546.
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Artist's impression of a gas giant planet forming in the disc around the young star HD 100546
Artist's impression of a gas giant planet forming in the disc around the young star HD 100546
This diagram illustrates how astronomers can capture the elusive spectra of hot-Jupiter planets by comparing observations including light from both the star and planet to those containing just the star.
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Isolating a Planet's Spectrum
Isolating a Planet's Spectrum
A team of researchers has devised a way to measure the internal properties of stars—a method that offers more accurate assessments of their orbiting planets.
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Verified by vibration
Verified by vibration
Twice as big in volume as the Earth, HD 40307 g straddles the line between "Super-Earth" and "mini-Neptune" and scientists aren't sure if it has a rocky surface or one that's buried beneath thick layers of gas and ice. One thing is certain though: at eight times the Earth's mass, its gravitational pull is much, much stronger.
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HD 40307 g
Experience the Gravity of a Super Earth
The artist's concept depicts Kepler-62e, a super-Earth-size planet in the habitable zone of a star smaller and cooler than the sun, located about 1,200 light-years from Earth in the constellation Lyra.
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Kepler-62e (Artist Concept)
Kepler-62e (Artist Concept)
The Kepler spacecraft, responsible for thousands of new potential disoveries.
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Kepler Spacecraft
Kepler Spacecraft
A unique feature of the seventh Kepler candidate catalog is that it is the first to fully automate the assessment of transit-like signals. The total height of each bar shows the total number of Kepler Objects of Interest (KOIs), or transit-like signals, in each catalog.
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Assessment of Kepler Dataset
Assessment of Kepler Dataset
This sky map shows the location of the star HD 219134 circle), host to the nearest confirmed rocky planet found to date outside of our solar system.
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Location of Nearest Rocky Exoplanet Known
Location of Nearest Rocky Exoplanet Known
Close-up of the planet Fomalhaut b as imaged by the Hubble Space Telescope. Fomalhaut b was discovered in Hubble data in 2008.
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HST ACS/HRC Wide View of Fomalhaut b Planet in 2004 and 2006
HST ACS/HRC Wide View of Fomalhaut b Planet in 2004 and 2006
This diagram compares our own solar system to Kepler-47, a double-star system containing two planets, one orbiting in the so-called "habitable zone." This is the sweet spot in a planetary system where liquid water might exist on the surface of a planet.
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Orbiting in the Habitable Zone of Two Suns
Orbiting in the Habitable Zone of Two Suns
For a tidally locked planet there is no day or night, only freezing darkness on one side and burning constant sunlight on the other. The terminator zone is bathed in constant twilight and would likely be the only place on the planet to be potentially hospitable.
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Earth at Twilight
Tidally locked planets (Earth at Twilight)
Astronomers detect lowest-mass planet around a star like the sun found using direct imaging techniques.
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Image of gas giant GJ 504b
Image of gas giant GJ 504b
In the three and a half years of its primary mission, NASA's Kepler spacecraft produced a mountain of data. Astronomers continue to mine it, finding new likely planets all the time - including Kepler-452 b, the most Earth-like exoplanet found so far. Take a look at how Kepler's cache of candidate planets has grown over time, and how we inch ever closer to finding another Earth.
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Getting Closer to Another Earth: Kepler's 4500+ Planet Candidates
Getting Closer to Another Earth: Kepler's 4500+ Planet Candidates
The third closest star system to the sun, called WISE J104915.57-531906, is at the center of the larger image, which was taken by NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE). It appeared to be a single object, but a sharper image (inset) from Gemini Observatory in Chile, revealed that it was binary star system, consisting of a pair of brown dwarfs.
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Brown Dwarfs in our 'Backyard'
Brown Dwarfs in our 'Backyard'
Cluster of Stars in Kepler's Sight - This image zooms into a small portion of Kepler's full field of view -- an expansive, 100-square-degree patch of sky in our Milky Way galaxy.
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Star Cluster NGC 6791 from Kepler First Light Image
Star Cluster NGC 6791 from Kepler First Light Image
The "super-Jupiter" Kappa Andromedae b, shown here in an artist's rendering, circles its star at nearly twice the distance that Neptune orbits the sun. With a mass about 13 times Jupiter's, the object glows with a reddish color.
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Artist's rendering of the "super-Jupiter" Kappa Andromedae b
Artist's rendering of the "super-Jupiter" Kappa Andromedae b
This artist's concept illustrates the fate of two different planets: the one on the left is similar to Earth, made up largely of silicate-based rocks with oceans coating its surface.
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A Tale of Two Worlds: Silicate Versus Carbon Planets (Artist Concept)
A Tale of Two Worlds: Silicate Versus Carbon Planets (Artist Concept)
This artist's concept illustrates an icy planet-forming disk around a young star called TW Hydrae, located about 175 light-years away in the Hydra, or Sea Serpent, constellation.
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Misty Star in the Sea Serpent
Misty Star in the Sea Serpent

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.
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Strange New Worlds

Explore an interactive gallery of some of the most intriguing and exotic planets discovered so far.
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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.
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