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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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This is an artist's concept of HD 189733b and its parent star.
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Extrasolar Planet's Hazy Atmosphere (Artist's Concept)
Extrasolar Planet's Hazy Atmosphere (Artist's Concept)
The first Earth-size planet discovered around a near solar twin, the discovery of Kepler-452b brings us closer than ever to finding an Earth-like planet.
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Infographic: Profile of planet Kepler-452b
Infographic: Profile of planet Kepler-452b
Astronomers have discovered one of the most distant planets known, a gas giant about 13,000 light-years from Earth, called OGLE-2014-BLG-0124L. The planet was discovered using a technique called microlensing, and the help of NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope and the Optical Gravitational Lensing Experiment, or OGLE. In this artist's illustration, planets discovered with microlensing are shown in yellow. The farthest lies in the center of our galaxy, 25,000 light-years away.
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Map of Exoplanets Found in our Galaxy (Artist's Concept)
Map of Exoplanets Found in our Galaxy (Artist's Concept)
Artist's representation of the "habitable zone," the range of orbits where liquid water is permitted on the surface of a planet.
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Odds are on Oodles of Earths
Odds are on Oodles of Earths
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
From the first three years of Kepler data, more than 3,500 potential worlds have emerged.
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Residential Candidates
Residential Candidates
NASA's Kepler spacecraft has spotted a planet that alternately runs late and early in its orbit because a second, "invisible" world is tugging on it. This is the first definite detection of a previously unknown planet using this method. No other technique could have found the unseen companion.
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An Invisible World
An Invisible World
Observed transit depths and theoretical models for GJ 1214 b
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Observed transit for GJ 1214 b
Observed transit for GJ 1214 b
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
NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope has found that the hottest part of a distant planet, named upsilon Andromedae b, is not under the glare of its host star as might be expected.
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Planetary Hot Spot Not Under the Glare of Star
Planetary Hot Spot Not Under the Glare of Star
This false-color near-infrared image has been processed to remove most of the scattered light from the star Kappa Andromedae to reveal its "super-Jupiter" companion, Kappa Andromedae b.
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Image of the "super-Jupiter" Kappa Andromedae b
Image of the "super-Jupiter" Kappa Andromedae b
This infrared data from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope tells astronomers that a distant gas planet, a so-called "hot Jupiter" called HD 189733b, might be smothered with high clouds. It is one of the first spectra of an alien world.
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Cracking the Code of Faraway Worlds: An Exoplanet Atmosphere
Cracking the Code of Faraway Worlds: An Exoplanet Atmosphere
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
An artist's impression of a red supergiant engulfing a Jupiter-like planet as it expands.
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Hungry Red Giant
Hungry Red Giant
The New Mexico Exoplanet Spectroscopic Survey Instrument (NESSI) will soon get its first "taste" of exoplanets, helping astronomers decipher their chemical composition.
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Exoplanets Soon to Gleam in the Eye of NESSI
Exoplanets Soon to Gleam in the Eye of NESSI
PSO J318.5-22 belongs to a special class of planets called rogue, or free-floating, planets. Wandering alone in the galaxy, they do not orbit a parent star.  These rogue planets glow faintly from the heat of their formation. Once they cool down, they will be dancing in the dark.
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PSO J318.5-22
Where the Nightlife Never Ends
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.
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Infographic: Planet Kepler-186f, trailblazer
Infographic: Planet Kepler-186f, trailblazer
The exoplanet Corot-7b is so close to its Sun-like host star that it must experience extreme conditions. This planet has a mass five times that of Earth’s and is in fact the closest known exoplanet to its host star, which also makes it the fastest — it orbits its star at a speed of more than 750 000 kilometres per hour.
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Artist's impression of Corot-7b
Artist's impression of Corot-7b
Animation of a frozen planet, similar to worlds in our own solar system's Kuiper Belt.
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Kuiper Belt World
Kuiper Belt World
Volunteers using DiskDetective, a NASA-sponsored citizen science website to find potential planetary nurseries, have made 1 million classifications in less than a year. Goddard astrophysicist Marc Kuchner, the project's principal investigator, explains how it works.
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'Disk Detectives' Top 1 Million Classifications in Search for Planetary Habitats
'Disk Detectives' Top 1 Million Classifications in Search for Planetary Habitats
This sculpture by Angela Palmer is created from the data gathered to date by the Kepler telescope. It literally reproduces in three dimensions the chunk of sky the Kepler telescope has been trained on for the past three years.
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Goldilocks
Goldilocks
This year we celebrate the discovery of 51 Pegasi b in October, 1995. This giant planet is about half the size of Jupiter and orbits its star in about 4 days. '51 Peg’ helped launch a whole new field of exploration.
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The discovery that changed the way we see our universe: 51 Pegasi b
The discovery that changed the way we see our universe: 51 Pegasi b
This video shows an artist's impression of the free-floating planet CFBDSIR J214947.2-040308.9.
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Artist's impression of the free-floating planet CFBDSIR J214947.2-040308.9
Artist's impression of the free-floating planet CFBDSIR J214947.2-040308.9
This artist's conception shows a young, hypothetical planet around a cool star. A soupy mix of potentially life-forming chemicals can be seen pooling around the base of the jagged rocks.
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Chemical Soups Around Cool Stars
Chemical Soups Around Cool Stars
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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TW Hydrae snow line distance compared to the Solar System
TW Hydrae snow line distance compared to the Solar System

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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