Tag Archives | exoplanet

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Hubble spots water on distant exoplanets

Peering into the atmospheres of planets many trillions of miles away using the Hubble Space Telescope, scientists have found the signature of water on five exoplanets. Although the presence of atmospheric water has been hinted at from previous observations of exoplanets, this is the first study to conclusively measure and compare the intensities of these […]

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Water discovered in remnants of destroyed exoplanet

Astrophysicists have found the first evidence of a water-rich rocky planetary body outside our solar system in its shattered remains orbiting a white dwarf 170 light years away. The analysis of the dust and debris surrounding the white dwarf star GD 61 was conducted by scientists at the Universities of Warwick and Cambridge and appears […]

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kepler7b

Exoplanet has its clouds mapped

NASA scientists using data from the Kepler and Spitzer space telescopes have created the first cloud map of a planet beyond our solar system, a Jupiter-like world known as Kepler-7b (depicted left, with Jupiter to the right). The planet is marked by high clouds in the west and clear skies in the east. Previous analyses […]

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A blue planet where it rains glass

Astronomers making visible-light observations with the Hubble Space Telescope have deduced the actual color of a planet orbiting another star 63 light-years away. This turbulent alien world is one of the nearest exoplanets to Earth that can be seen crossing the face of its star. Known as HD 189733b, the planet is a deep cobalt […]

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exoplanet

Lots more habitable planets out there, thanks to clouds

‘ An intriguing new study that calculates the influence of cloud behavior on climate doubles the number of potentially habitable planets orbiting red dwarfs, the most common type of stars in the universe. Data from NASA’s Kepler Mission previously suggested there is approximately one Earth-size planet in the habitable zone of each red dwarf. The […]

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exoplanet_gliese_667c

Nearby star may have 3 habitable planets

Astronomers have announced that the star Gliese 667C in the constellation of Scorpius is likely orbited by between five and seven planets and three of those may be habitable. The planets are in the so-called “Goldilocks” zone around the star, where liquid water could exist. Only 22 light years distant, Gliese 667C is about one […]

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exoplanet_kepler76b

New technique for finding distant planets makes its first discovery

For the first time, astrophysicists from Tel Aviv University and the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics have discovered an exoplanet using a new technique that relies on Einstein’s special theory of relativity. Previously, the two most successful techniques for finding exoplanets were radial velocity (looking for wobbling stars – caused by an orbiting planet pulling on […]

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First discovery of extraterrestrial life will likely be around a white dwarf star, say astrophysicists

Detecting extraterrestrial life from tell-tale atmospheric signatures is much easier to do when the planet under observation is orbiting a dying star, say Harvard Smithsonian scientists who believe that white dwarf systems are the best candidates for catching our first glimpse of life outside our solar system. Explaining their reasoning in Monthly Notices of the […]

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kepler

Habitable planets galore, suggests Kepler data-crunching

A detailed analysis of the first three years of data from NASA’s Kepler mission, which already has discovered thousands of potential exoplanets, contains good news for those searching for habitable worlds outside our solar system. The findings, presented today at a session during the American Astronomical Society meeting, were compiled by a team of astronomers […]

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