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Since the landmark discovery in 1992 of two planets orbiting a star outside of our Solar System, thousands of new worlds have been added to a rapidly growing list of 'exoplanets' in the Milky Way galaxy. We've learnt many things from this vast catalogue of alien worlds orbiting alien stars. But one small detail stands out like a sore thumb. We've found nothing else out there like our own Solar System. This has led some to conclude that our home star and its brood could be outliers in some way – perhaps the only planetary system of its kind. By...

TOI 700 d is a landmark discovery for NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite NASA’s newest planet hunter just bagged some big game. For the first time, the agency’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) has discovered a roughly Earth-size planet in the habitable zone of its host star, the zone of orbital distances where liquid water could be stable on a world’s surface, researchers announced today (Jan. 6). The newfound exoplanet, known as TOI 700 d, lies just 101.5 light-years from Earth, making it a good candidate for follow-up observations by other instruments, scientists added. “TESS was designed and launched specifically...

This artist's concept depicts a planetary system. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech An international research team led by Université de Montréal astrophysicist Lauren Weiss has discovered that exoplanets orbiting the same star tend to have similar sizes and a regular orbital spacing. This pattern, revealed by new W. M. Keck Observatory observations of planetary systems discovered by the Kepler Telescope, could suggest that most planetary systems have a different formation history than the solar system. Thanks in large part to the NASA Kepler Telescope, launched in 2009, many thousands of exoplanets are now known. This large sample allows researchers to not only...

Image montage showing the Maunakea Observatories, Kepler Space Telescope, and night sky with K2 Fields and discovered planetary systems (dots) overlaid. An international team of scientists discovered more than 100 planets based on images from Kepler operating in the 'K2 Mission'. The team confirmed and characterized the planets using a suite of telescopes worldwide, including four on Maunakea (the twin telescopes of Keck Observatory, the Gemini­North Telescope, and the Infrared Telescope Facility). The planet image on the right is an artist's impression of a representative planet. Credit: Karen Teramura (UHIfA) based on night sky image of the ecliptic plane by...

Discovery images of RR245. The images show RR245's slow motion across the sky over three hours. Credit: OSSOS team ================================================================================================ An international team of astronomers have discovered a new dwarf planet orbiting in the disk of small icy worlds beyond Neptune. The new object is roughly 700 kilometers in size and has one of the largest orbits for a dwarf planet. Designated 2015 RR245 by the International Astronomical Union's Minor Planet Center, it was found using the Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope on Maunakea, Hawaii, as part of the ongoing Outer solar system Origins Survey (OSSOS). "The icy worlds beyond Neptune trace how...

Astronomers used the Harlan J. Smith Telescope at the University of Texas at Austin's McDonald Observatory near Fort Davis, Texas, to search for a planet around star CI Tau. Credit: Ethan Tweedie Photography ================================================================================================== In contradiction to the long-standing idea that larger planets take longer to form, U.S. astronomers today announced the discovery of a giant planet in close orbit around a star so young that it still retains a disk of circumstellar gas and dust. "For decades, conventional wisdom held that large Jupiter-mass planets take a minimum of 10 million years to form," said Christopher Johns-Krull, the lead author...

This cartoon shows the transiting planet GJ 1132b to scale against its host star GJ 1132. Credit: Zach Berta-Thompson ==================================================================================================================== Scientists have discovered a new exoplanet that, in the language of "Star Wars," would be the polar opposite of frigid Hoth, and even more inhospitable than the deserts of Tatooine. But instead of residing in a galaxy far, far away, this new world is, galactically speaking, practically next door. The new planet, named GJ 1132b, is Earth-sized and rocky, orbiting a small star located a mere 39 light-years from Earth, making it the closest Earth-sized exoplanet yet discovered. Astrophysicists from...