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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 were elated to find clear skies on a Neptune-size planet called HAT-P-11b, as illustrated here. Without clouds to block their view, they were able to identify water vapor molecules in t...
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Seeing Starlight Through a Planet's Rim (Artist's Concept)
Seeing Starlight Through a Planet's Rim (Artist's Concept)
The diagram compares the planets of the inner solar system to Kepler-69, a two-planet system about 2,700 light-years from Earth in the constellation Cygnus. The two planets of Kepler-69 orbit a sta...
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Kepler-69 and the Solar System
Kepler-69 and the Solar System
Artist’s conception of the extrasolar ring system circling the young giant planet or brown dwarf J1407b. The rings are shown eclipsing the young sun-like star J1407, as they would have appeared in ...
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J1407b: Super-Saturn
J1407b: Super-Saturn
This artist's concept depicts Kepler-186f, the first validated Earth-size planet to orbit a distant star in the habitable zone -- a range of distance from a star where liquid water might pool on th...
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Kepler-186f, the First Earth-size Planet in the Habitable Zone (Artist's Concept)
Kepler-186f, the First Earth-size Planet in the Habitable Zone (Artist's Concept)
NASA's Kepler mission has discovered a new planetary system that is home to the smallest planet yet found around a star like our sun, approximately 210 light-years away in the constellation Lyra.
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A Tiny Planet (Artist's Concept)
A Tiny Planet (Artist's Concept)
These doomed worlds were among the first and creepiest to be discovered. They orbit an undead star known as a pulsar. 
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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 plot shows the masses and sizes of the smallest exoplanets for which both quantities have been measured. The solar system planets (shown in red) are for comparison.
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Mars-size Kepler-138b Gets a Mass
Mars-size Kepler-138b Gets a Mass
The graphic tells NASA's Kepler spacecraft's story by the numbers from the moment it began hunting for planets outside our solar system on May 12, 2009.
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Kepler's Six Years In Science (and Counting)
Kepler's Six Years In Science (and Counting)
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
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.
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Cold and Close Celestial Orb (Artist's Concept)
Cold and Close Celestial Orb (Artist's Concept)
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
The artist's conception shows a hypothetical planet with two moons orbiting in the habitable zone of a red dwarf star.
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Red Dwarf Planet
Red Dwarf Planet
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...
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Exo-eclipse in x-ray vision
Exo-eclipse in x-ray vision
This far-off blue planet may look like a friendly haven – but don’t be deceived! Weather here is deadly. The cobalt color comes from a hazy, blow-torched atmosphere containing clouds laced with gla...
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A poster done in the style of a vintage poster for a horror movie. Reading "Rains of Terror" It's death by a million cuts on this slasher planet. Jagged edges of glass can be seen battering a spacecraft on this alien world.
Rains of Terror Poster
This diagram shows how astronomers observed a distant gas giant planet around OGLE-2005-BLG-169 using microlensing.
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Identification of Exoplanet Host Star OGLE-2005-BLG-169
Identification of Exoplanet Host Star OGLE-2005-BLG-169
This figure charts 30 hours of observations taken by NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope of a strongly irradiated exoplanet (an planet orbiting a star beyond our own). It shows the very rapid heating th...
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Exoplanet HD 80606b Infrared Light Curve
Exoplanet HD 80606b Infrared Light Curve
We now believe there is at least one planet for every star in our galaxy. This could mean as many as 100 to 400 BILLION planets in our galaxy alone. This major finding from the Kepler mission, laun...
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Each Planet Is Unique, Every 100 Billion+ of Them
Each Planet Is Unique, Every 100 Billion+ of Them
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
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 l...
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HD 40307 g
Experience the Gravity of a Super Earth
The sweep of NASA Kepler mission’s search for small, habitable planets in the last six years.
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Searching for Habitable Worlds
Searching for Habitable Worlds
This is an artist's concept of a hypothetical 10-million-year-old star system. The bright blur at the center is a star much like our sun. The other orb in the image is a gas-giant planet like Jupit...
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Gas Giants Form Quickly
Gas Giants Form Quickly
NASA's Kepler mission confirmed the discovery of its first rocky planet, named Kepler-10b. Measuring 1.4 times the size of Earth, it is the smallest planet ever discovered outside our solar system.
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Kepler Mission Discovers Its First Rocky Planet
Kepler Mission Discovers Its First Rocky Planet
Over its ten years in space, NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope has evolved into a premier tool for studying exoplanets.
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Spitzer: 10 years of surprises
Spitzer: 10 years of surprises
This artist's conception shows Kepler-36c as it might look from the surface of neighboring Kepler-36b.
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A Planetary Odd Couple
A Planetary Odd Couple
NASA Associate Administrator Thomas Zurbuchen and TESS Project Scientist Padi Boyd discuss Kepler's legacy, the search for life and the big question: Are we alone?
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NASA Associate Administrator Thomas Zurbuchen and TESS Project Scientist Padi Boyd discuss Kepler's legacy, the search for life and the big question: Are we alone?
Next Steps in the Search for Life

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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