Extrasolar Planets
Book Review: Vistas of Many Worlds
While many astronomy books are based around images that show us how the Universe appears to us right now, as…
Closest Exoplanet Deserves a ‘Real’ Name, Says Uwingu
It’s time to “get real” about naming exoplanets, says Uwingu CEO and scientist Dr. Alan Stern. And so the latest…
Kepler Team Identifies Planet Impostors that are Binary Stars in Disguise
Observations by the Kepler satellite have advanced our knowledge of stars and their orbiting planets, yielding more than 100 confirmed…
Could There be 100 Billion Potentially Habitable Planets in the Galaxy?
As we’ve reported recently, the likelihood of findings habitable Earth-sized worlds just seems to keep getting better and better. But…
Exoplanet Atmospheres Provide Clues to Solar System Formation
The most detailed look yet at the atmosphere of a distant exoplanet has revealed a mixture of water vapor and…
Habitable Earth-Like Exoplanets Might Be Closer Than We Think
Size might matter when it comes to stars having habitable environments for planets, and in this case smaller might be…
WISE Nabs the Closest Brown Dwarfs Yet Discovered
We now know our stellar neighbors just a little better, and a new discovery may help tell us how common…
Evil Empire Beware: Gas Giant Planets are Hard to Destroy
Last year, physicists worked out the plausibility of a fully functional (if not fictional) Death Star being able to destroy…
First Direct Observation of a Nearby Protoplanet
Astronomers have taken what is likely the first-ever direct image of a planet that is still undergoing its formation, embedded…
Why Dying Stars Might be a Good Place to Look for Life
We’ve currently found 867 different exoplanets, but have yet to definitely determine if one of those harbors life. How will…