Gliese 581 Artist's rendering of the star Gliese 581, with exoplanet Gliese 581c (neighbor to newly discovered Gliese 581g) in the foreground. ESO
Posted on 10/16/2010 4:48:43 PM PDT by SunkenCiv
If it seems like a new extrasolar planet is discovered every week these days, that's because there is. In fact, the rate is actually faster than one per week -- 70 have been discovered thus far this year alone, bringing the overall tally of confirmed exoplanets at 494. At that pace we very well might hit exoplanet number 500 before the end of this month... The first definitive exoplanet was confirmed in 1992, and it's taken us almost two decades to cross the 500 threshold. But given the drastic uptick in discoveries and the increased scientific emphasis on exoplanet discovery, some researchers think we'll log number 1,000 in the next few years... Better technology has allowed astronomers to assert with far greater certainty that a flicker in a star's brightness or a small wobble in its position is indeed caused by an orbiting body.
(Excerpt) Read more at popsci.com ...
Gliese 581 Artist's rendering of the star Gliese 581, with exoplanet Gliese 581c (neighbor to newly discovered Gliese 581g) in the foreground. ESO
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What is an exoplanet?
[I think this artist's conception comes from NASA]
It’s a planet in orbit around a star other than our Sun.
Any planet orbiting a star other than ours.
eggplant?
:’)
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