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Celestial waltz: Two giant exoplanets between the size of Saturn and Jupiter are caught in a 'gravitational dance' around a Sun-like star 800 light-years away from Earth

02/07/20 17:03

Astronomers that make up an international consortium of universities and groups known as the Wide Area Search for Planets (WASP) found the waltzing worlds. According to the scientists, these giant objects are able to 'feel each other's gravity', which causes on to speed up and slowdown as it overtakes the other world....read

Weird exoplanet 40 times larger than Earth orbiting a star 730 light-years away may be the exposed core of a Jupiter-like gas giant, scientists claim
01/07/20 15:41
Scientists argued TOI 849 b lost its surrounding gases during a collision, or because it passed too close to its sun. The planet is so close that it completes an orbit every 18 hours.
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Mysterious exoplanet 40 times bigger than Earth and 730 light-years away in the 'hot Neptuian desert' may be the core of a gas giant
14/04/20 16:27
Experts believe they have discovered a remnant core of an exoplanet that is 40 times that of Earth, allowing them to see the heart of gas giants similar to Jupiter and Saturn for the first time.
Extreme exoplanet where it rains molten iron and temperatures reach 4,400F with 11,000mph winds is discovered 640 light years from Earth
11/03/20 16:29
It was discovered by researchers from Geneva University in Switzerland using the European Southern Observatory (ESO) Very Large Telescope in Chile.
Large rocky planet 124 light years away from Earth appears to be covered in WATER and 'could have right conditions to sustain alien life'
27/02/20 00:02
The exoplanet, called K2-18b, is 124 light years away and may have the right conditions to sustain life, according to researchers from Cambridge University.
Jupiter sized exoplanet with a surface temperature of 1,800F 'is on the edge of destruction' as it orbits around its star once every 18 HOURS
20/02/20 16:23
Astronomers from the University of Warwick say it's 18 hour orbit is the shortest time a planet of this type has been seen going around a star.
NASA astronomers develop a new method to detect oxygen on exoplanets - claiming it could help accelerate the search for alien life outside our Solar System
06/01/20 16:01
Scientists at University of California Riverside are using NASA's new James Webb Space telescope to detect changes in light that may be suggestive of oxygen on planets outside our Solar System.
Six hot rocky planets orbiting very close to their stars could shed light on the geology of planets in our solar system and how the Earth was formed
23/12/19 14:44
Researchers from the Open University have been studying six new exoplanets discovered by the European Space Observatory's planet-hunting telescope in Chile.
Scientists who discovered the first exoplanet orbiting a sun-like star win the Nobel Prize for Physics alongside a Princeton cosmologist who studied the Big Bang
08/10/19 10:02
Professor Michel Mayor (pictured) and Professor Didier Queloz, both working in Switzerland, will share the prestigious award with Canadian cosmologist Professor James Peebles.
Exoplanets orbiting distant stars could have MORE diverse life than on Earth, 'surprising' study finds
22/08/19 22:00
Geochemists at the University of Chicago used NASA software to model the likely conditions on different types of exoplanet - in particular, their climates and potential ocean habitats.
Stunning video maps out all of the 4,000 exoplanets discovered by NASA since the first distant world was spotted in 1992
12/07/19 15:53
The US space agency released the video to mark the discovery of its 4,000th exoplanet in June. The majority of exoplanets were found by Kepler and TESS.
Astronomers spot TWO exoplanets in the early stages of existence orbiting a young star 370 light-years away
04/06/19 19:17
Scientists say the duo of alien planets, which are orbiting the star PD-70 about 370 light-years away from Earth, are plowing a path through a gaseous disk that flanks their sun as they continue to grow.
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NASA's exoplanet-hunting spacecraft has discovered its first Earth-sized world in nearby solar system
16/04/19 22:57
Scientists estimate the distant world as a radius of about 2.7 times Earth’s, and may be home to a substantial atmosphere.But, its atmosphere would be much colder than our own.
The long road to discovery: First potential exoplanet spotted by Kepler 10 years ago is FINALLY confirmed
06/03/19 17:35
Dubbed Kepler-1658b, it orbits its star once every 3.85 days and endured a tumultuous journey to discovery. It orbits its star once every 3.85 days and has been called a 'hot Jupiter'
The exoplanet with a tail: Researchers discover giant world with helium gas trailing behind it as radiation strips its atmosphere
06/12/18 19:07
Researchers used the CARMENES instrument on the 3.5-meter telescope of the Calar Alto Observatory in Spain to identify five exoplanets that appear to have helium envelopes.
TESS catches a comet: NASA's new exoplanet-hunting satellite spots an orbiting space rock while running tests ahead of its official mission
06/08/18 23:23
TESS spotted a comet soaring roughly 29 million miles (48 million km) from Earth on July 25, just hours before its first official science operations. It will now go on to search for exoplanets.
Our best hope of finding aliens? Rocky world 11 light years away could have the perfect conditions for life to thrive
12/07/18 13:16
Researchers from Brazil's National Observatory used the Sloan Digital Sky Survey’s Apogee spectroscopic instrument at Apache Point Observatory in New Mexico to make the finding.
See the blood red sky of Trappist-1d and the twin suns of Kepler-16b: NASA reveals 'Exoplanet Travel Bureau' offering virtual tours
28/05/18 18:01
From the distant Kepler discoveries to the potentially habitable Trappist-1d, the Exoplanet Travel Bureau site offers a stunning virtual tour through planets that sit many light-years away.
Boost in search for alien life after astronomers discover traces of helium in an exoplanet's atmosphere for the first time
02/05/18 17:00
An international team of astronomers, led by a PhD student from the University of Exeter, discovered evidence of the inert gas on exoplanet WASP-107b 200 light years away.
HOW DO SCIENTISTS STUDY THE ATMOSPHERE OF EXOPLANETS?
02/05/18 14:38
Distant stars and their orbiting planets often have conditions unlike anything we see in our atmosphere.
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Saturn-sized exoplanet 700 light-years away has WATER in its atmosphere, NASA reveals
01/03/18 22:26
WASP-39b is a scorching ‘hot Saturn’ exoplanet in the constellation Virgo. It sits roughly 700 light-years away, and is now estimated to have three times more water in its vicinity than Saturn.
A 'scaled-up version of Earth' with a gassy atmosphere that could host alien life is discovered 111 light years away
05/12/17 17:00
Experts led by the University of Montreal, Canada, found that the exoplanet K2-18b (artist's impression) is mostly made up of rock, just like our own planet.
Blistering-hot exoplanet that rains 'sunscreen' and is six times the size of Jupiter is discovered by Hubble telescope
27/10/17 13:45
Researchers at Penn State University have found that exoplanet Kepler-13Ab has bouts of precipitation made up of Titanium dioxide - a key ingredient in sunscreen.
Did ‘Super Earths’ spread life around the universe? Study finds they draw asteroids to other worlds and could help seed life
26/09/17 22:56
Researchers at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas found that the presence of a super-Earth planet can influence the rate of asteroid collisions. This could also influence a planet's habitability.
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Are we being watched? Aliens living on nine exoplanets would be in a perfect position to spy on Earth, experts reveal
08/09/17 13:10
Research led by Queen’s University Belfast and the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research in Germany found nine exoplanets are ideally placed to observe transits of Earth (stock image).
Astronomers spot a huge planet outside the solar system with an upper atmosphere hot enough to boil IRON
02/08/17 17:00
The 'sunscreen' on the distant gas giant, known as WASP-121b, was identified by scientists at Exeter University observing glowing water molecules in the atmosphere.
Could YOU find alien life on Proxima b?New project calls for help to search the possibly habitable exoplanet's star system
26/06/17 20:55
A researcher at Queen Mary University is calling upon the public to help search for alien life on Proxima Centauri and two other nearby stars: Barnard's Star and Ross 154.
The art of alien worlds: NASA reveals how it creates its incredible exoplanet artist's impressions
08/06/17 19:13
Visualization scientist Robert Hurt of Caltech’s IPAC center, and multimedia producer Tim Pyle have created some of NASA’s most memorable images with data from the Spitzer Space Telescope.
Rocky 'super-Earth' 39 light years away could be our best chance of finding alien life outside our solar system
19/04/17 17:00
Scientists used telescopes based near La Serena, Chile, to spot the planet, dubbed LHS 1140b. Its large size means that a magma ocean could have existed on its surface for millions of years.
The incredible animation that shows four alien worlds orbiting a star 129 light years away
06/02/17 22:19
The planets, each more massive than Jupiter, are circling a bright young star that lies in the constellation Pegasus, 129 light years away. It was created with seven years of observations.
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Clouds of ruby and sapphire cover the skies of a gas giant: First exoplanet weather forecast reveals the stunning conditions 1,000 light years away
12/12/16 16:11
Researchers from Warwick University claim that powerful winds of rubies and sapphires are striking HAT-P-7b - a planet sixteen times larger than Earth.
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New super-Earth is discovered nearby: Exoplanet is found orbiting a star 33 light years away - and there could be more
18/11/16 11:25
The exoplanet was spotted by the Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias and the University of La Laguna in the Canary Islands. Rocky planets such as this are usually found in groups.
Now THAT'S a storm: Violent volcanic exoplanet may experience TRILLIONS of lightning flashes in just one hour
04/07/16 17:08
Astronomers at St Andrews University say the entire surface of this exoplanet, called Kepler-10b, could be made up of constantly erupting volcanoes.
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Meet Robert, the alien hunting AI: Smart software will scour exoplanets for signs of life
29/06/16 19:38
The UCL software also has a 'dream mode' that allows it to predict what forms alien signals may take so it knows what to look for.
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Could aliens be hiding under layers of ice? Exoplanets may have signs of life trapped beneath their frozen oceans
15/06/16 11:57
New research led by Dr Lena Noack from the Royal Observatory of Belgium suggests there could be life hidden under layers of high-pressure ice on planets up to 10 times the size of Earth.
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Clouds on giant 'hot Jupiter' exoplanets could be hiding water worlds below
08/06/16 23:05
Clouds and haze blocking the atmosphere of numerous ‘hot Jupiter’ exoplanets could be masking the presence of water, according to new research from Nasa's Jet Propulsion Lab.
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Mysterious 'Planet Nine' could be an alien exoplanet stolen by our sun 4.5 billion years ago
31/05/16 22:54
Astronomers at Lund University in Sweden say it is 'highly likely' Planet 9 is an exoplanet. They believe it was 'stolen' by our sun, but remained completely undetected ever since.
The hot super-Earths being 'cooked' by radiation: Nasa discovers exoplanets that are being stripped of their atmospheres
11/04/16 09:00
Astrophysicists at the University of Birmingham used data from the Nasa Kepler space telescope to discover the exoplanets. An artist's illustration is pictured.
Exoplanets where the oceans flow BACKWARDS could harbour alien life: Simulations reveal there may be more habitable regions than first thought
04/04/16 19:01
Researchers at the University of East Anglia, modelled exoplanet oceans (illustrated) with very low and very high salinity, similar to freshwater lakes and the Dead Sea.
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‘Smooth light’ may help us spot Earth's twin: Radical new optical system could take much sharper images of exoplanets
30/03/16 21:13
Russian scientists say they have a technique for creating a telescope that can see these planets directly – and they say it may even help us find Earth's twin.
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Mystery Saturn-sized exoplanet is found lurking near the 'bulge' of the Milky Way
23/03/16 16:42
An international team of researchers, led by the University of Notre Dame used the gravitational microlensing method to detect a gas giant exoplanet similar to Saturn (shown) orbiting a star.
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Kepler finds 234 new exoplanet candidates: Astronomers now estimate up to a billion Earth-sized alien planets in the galaxy
07/01/16 23:01
Kepler space telescope may be broken, but that didn't stop it from finding 234 potential exoplanets in 2014, astronomers at the 227th meeting of the American Astronomical Society revealed.
Are half of the exoplanets found by Kepler GHOSTS? Probe's data may be far less accurate than thought, say scientists
07/12/15 18:58
Half of the objects in Kepler's 'candidate of planets' are likely eclipsing stars or brown dwarfs, rather than larger gas giants, according to researchers in Portugal.
The exoplanets that hint at life billions of years older than Earth: Five new planets raises possibility of super-advanced civilisations
13/07/15 19:34
Five Earth-sized planets so ancient they were born not long after the dawn of time have raised the possibility we could find life on planets far older than we expected.
The exoplanet that thinks it's a COMET: Huge hydrogen tail could help scientists hunt for oceans on habitable worlds
24/06/15 17:00
A study led by the University of Geneva has found a comet-like exoplanet (artist's impression shown). Called GJ 436b, it is Neptune-sized and located 33 light-years away.
Hot and windy on HD 189733b! Exoplanet has temperature of 5,400°F with gusts of 620mph
13/04/15 16:25
Swiss researchers measured the temperature of 'Hot Jupiter' HD 189733b (artist's illustration shown). They found the temperature reaches up to 3,000°C in the atmosphere.
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Massive boost in the hunt for alien life: Billions of exoplanets are more Earth-like than first thought, claims study
16/01/15 01:32
Astronomers at the University of Toronto claim many exoplanets rotate around their stars, and spin at such a speed that they exhibit a day-night cycle similar to Earth.
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The telescopes that could find a new Earth: Planet hunting project starts automatically scanning the skies for exoplanets
14/01/15 23:45
High in the Chilean desert, the Next-Generation Transit Survey (NGTS) has begun automatically scanning the skies for exoplanets.
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Relax under the two suns of Kepler 16b and skydive in the superstrong gravity of HD 40307g: Nasa reveals vintage travel poster designs for real exoplanets
07/01/15 20:27
The posters were created by Nasa's Jet Propulsion Lab, and are marked as coming from the Exoplanet Travel Bureau, and come a day after eight new planets were been discovered in the 'Goldilocks' zone.
The 'extreme' exoplanet where winds howl at the speed of sound on days hot enough to melt steel - while temperatures plummet to below 1,000 degrees Fahrenheit at night
09/10/14 19:44
Nasa's Hubble Space Telescope has made the most detailed global map yet of the glow from a turbulent planet outside our solar system - and found an astonishingly inhospitable environment.
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Exoplanet with the longest year discovered: Kepler-421b orbits its star every 704 days - and this changes what we know about gas giants
22/07/14 16:33
Researchers at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics discovered Kepler-421b (illustration pictured) using data from the Nasa Kepler spacecraft.
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