Exoplanets TOP STORY
First Earth-sized Rocky Exoplanet Found 
© Keck Observatory
Mars Imaged by Hubble
A team of astronomers has found the first Earth-sized planet outside the solar system that has a rocky composition like that of Earth. This exoplanet, known as Kepler-78b, orbits its star very closely every 8.5 hours, making it much too hot to support life. The results are being published in the journal Nature.
Full Story
Exoplanets
Misaligned Planets in a Distant Star System
© Iowa State
Misaligned Planets
Using data from NASA's Kepler space telescope, an international team of astronomers has discovered a distant planetary system featuring multiple planets orbiting at a severe tilt to their host star.
Exoplanets
A Strange Lonely Planet Found Without a Star
An international team of astronomers has discovered an exotic young planet that is not orbiting a star. This free-floating planet, dubbed PSO J318.5-22, is just 80 light-years away from Earth and has a mass only six times that of Jupiter. The planet formed a mere 12 million years ago -- a newborn in planet lifetimes.
Exoplanets
Telescopes Reveal Patchy Clouds on Exotic World
Astronomers using data from NASA's Kepler and Spitzer space telescopes have created the first cloud map of a planet beyond our solar system, a sizzling, Jupiter-like world known as Kepler-7b.
Exoplanets
How Engineers Modified the Spitzer Telescope to Probe Exoplanets
Now approaching its 10th anniversary, NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope has evolved into a premier observatory for an endeavor not envisioned in its original design: the study of worlds around other stars, called exoplanets.
Exoplanets
New Observations of a Water-Rich Atmosphere Super-Earth
A Japanese research team of astronomers and planetary scientists has used Subaru Telescope's two optical cameras, Suprime-Cam and the Faint Object Camera and Spectrograph (FOCAS), with a blue transmission filter to observe planetary transits of super-Earth GJ 1214 b (Gilese 1214 b) (Figure 1).
Exoplanets
The Attraction of Hot Jupiters 
When the Space Age began, astronomers knew of exactly zero planets outside the solar system. What a difference 50 years makes.
Exoplanets
Hubble's Universe Unfiltered: Planet Discoveries Revisited
The field of extrasolar planets has exploded over the last couple decades, providing an entirely new suite of information on planetary systems in general and perspective on our own solar system in particular.
Exoplanets
Astronomers Image Lowest-mass Exoplanet Around a Sun-like Star
Using infrared data from the Subaru Telescope in Hawaii, an international team of astronomers has imaged a giant planet around the bright star GJ 504.
Exoplanets
Kepler Mission Manager Update: Recovery Ongoing
The team has continued exploratory recovery testing of Reaction Wheel 4 (RW4). On Thursday, July 25, 2013, the wheel spun in both directions in response to commands.
Exoplanets
Pulsating Star Sheds Light on Exoplanet
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.
Exoplanets
NASA X-ray Telescope Observes Planet Passing in Front of its Star for the First Time
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 star.
Exoplanets
New Resource Guide on Exoplanets Available to Teachers
A new resource guide, The Search for Planets Around Other Stars, is now available and was published by the NASA Astrophysics Education and Outreach Forum and the Astronomical Society of the Pacific.
Exoplanets
Snow in an Infant Planetary System
A snow line has been imaged in a far-off infant planetary system for the very first time. The snow line, located in the disc around the Sun-like star TW Hydrae, promises to tell us more about the formation of planets and comets, the factors that decide their composition, and the history of the Solar System. The results are published today in Science Express.
Exoplanets
NASA Awards University of Montana Grant to Search for Earth-like Exoplanets
NASA recently awarded researchers at the University of Montana a grant to support a $1.125 million project to build a dedicated observatory to detect Earth-like exoplanets.
Exoplanets
Hubble Spots Blue Planet
Astronomers using the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope have, for the first time, determined the true color of a planet orbiting another star. If seen up close this planet, known as HD 189733b, would be a deep cobalt blue, reminiscent of Earth's color as seen from space.
More top stories from February.
Exoplanets Mission Reports
Coming soon
Latest Video
The Attraction of Hot Jupiters
Hubble's Universe Unfiltered: Planet Discoveries Revisited
Project 1640 Sees Exoplanets 128 Light Years Away
Exoplanets Detection, Atmospheres and Habitability Lecture
Hubble Captures Dramatic Changes on a Faraway Planet
JPL Proposes FINESSE Mission for Exoplanets Atmosphere Detection
James Cameron on Avatar
Top News Archives
February 2013
January 2013
December 2012
More coming soon...
Calendar
- 8 Dec: Exoplanets and Disks: Their Formation and Diversity
- 9 Dec: ASTROBIO 2013: An International Workshop on Astrobiology
- 9 Dec: NASA Advisory Council Audit, Finance and Analysis Committee Meeting
- 9 Dec: NASA Advisory Council Human Exploration and Operations Committee Meeting
- 9 Dec: NASA Discusses Curiosity Radiation Findings
- 9 Dec: AGU Fall Meeting
- 9 Dec: Falcon 9 Launch to Resupply the ISS
- 10 Dec: NASA Advisory Council Technology and Innovation Committee Meeting
- 10 Dec: Mars One, Lockheed Martin, SSTL Press Conference
- 10 Dec: STA lunch with Bill Wrobel, Wallops; Dale Nash, MARS; Frank Culbertson, Orbital
- * Submit Your Event | More Events *
Recent Articles
Masthead