NASA Missions are Finding Water in Surprising Places
As NASA scientists explore our solar system and search for new worlds, they are finding water in surprising places. Water is but one piece of…
Exoplanet News
Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite – The Search for Planets Outside Our Solar System
The Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) is set to discover thousands of exoplanets in orbit around the brightest stars in the sky. The Transiting Exoplanet…
“Chemical Fingerprints” Could Help Scientists Recognize Life on the Surface of Exoplanets
A new catalog of reflectance spectra for a diverse range of pigmented microorganisms may help scientists recognize life on the surface of planets orbiting stars…
Research Shows Billions of Planets in the Milky Way Have the Potential for Life
Astronomers reveal that billions of the stars in the Milky Way will have one to three planets in the habitable zone, where there is the…
Habitable Exoplanets Could Experience a Wide Range of Climates
New research from astronomers at the University of Washington details how some habitable exoplanets could experience wildly unpredictable climates. As telescopes of ever-greater power scan…
Astronomers Identify a Quadruple Star System, 30 Ari
Using the Robo-AO adaptive optics system and the PALM-3000 adaptive optics system, astronomers have identified a planet in a quadruple star system for only the…
New Technique Analyzes Clouds Around Exoplanets
Research from MIT details a new technique that analyzes data from NASA’s Kepler space observatory to determine the types of clouds on planets that orbit…
New Titius-Bode-Based Exoplanet Predictions – 2 Planets in the Habitable Zone of Each Star
Using the Titius-Bode relation and Kepler data, astronomers from Australian National University estimate that the standard star has about two planets in the habitable zone….
Transforming Mini-Neptunes into Habitable Super-Earths
A new study from the University of Washington details how strong irradiation from the host star can cause planets known as mini-Neptunes in the habitable…
LBTI Completes First Study of Dust in the “Habitable Zone”
The Large Binocular Telescope Interferometer has completed its first study of dust in the “habitable zone” around a star, opening a new door to finding…
New Exoplanet-Hunting Facility (NGTS) Achieves First Light
The Next-Generation Transit Survey has achieved first light and will focus on discovering Neptune-sized and smaller planets, with diameters between two and eight times that…
Astronomers Discover Eight New Planets in “Goldilocks” Zone
Using Kepler data, a team of astronomers has discovered eight new planets orbiting their stars at a distance where liquid water can exist on the…
Kepler Discovers Small Exoplanets
Scientists have validated eight more candidate planets and added another 554 candidates to the roll of potential planets, six of which are near-Earth-size and orbit…
Study Details Why Super-Earths Have Long-Lasting Oceans
A newly published study from the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics reveals why oceans on super-Earths, once established, can last for billions of years. For life…
Kepler Detects A Super-Earth Transiting the Bright K-Dwarf HIP 116454
Despite a malfunction that ended its primary mission in May 2013, NASA’s Kepler spacecraft is still alive and working and has detected a newfound planet,…
A High-Obliquity Planet Could Be Habitable
A newly published study from scientists at MIT reveals that even a high-obliquity planet with a nearly horizontal axis could potentially support life, so long…
Planets in Habitable Zones of M Dwarfs May Have Burned Away Chances for Life
New research reveals that planets in the habitable zone of low-mass stars may have long since lost their chance at hosting life because of intense…
Astronomers Use Ground-Based Telescope to Measure Super-Earth Transit
Using the 2.5-meter Nordic Optical Telescope, astronomers have measured the transit of exoplanet 55 Cancri e — this is the first time that a super-Earth…