NASA has confirmed the discovery of a record number of 715 new exoplanets, detected using the Kepler telescope. Four of these planets could sustain life.
The recent discovery doubles the number of exoplanets (planets outside our solar system) which now stands at 1,700. The 715 planets are located in solar-systems similar to ours, where several planets orbiting a star. Among them, four planets (Kepler-174d, Kepler-296f, Kepler-298d and Kepler-309c) is situated in the habitable zone, an ideal distance that allows for liquid water and maybe even forms of life.
A record breaking day for Kepler: The histogram shows the number of planet discoveries by year for roughly the past two decades of the exoplanet search. The blue bar shows previous planet discoveries, the red bar shows previous Kepler planet discoveries, the gold bar displays the 715 new planets.
The first exoplanets were detected 20 years ago and since then, checking them was very difficult. Researchers need to be sure that their information on the existence of planets are correct. Now, scientists from NASA have used a new method: they considered the stars who have around them more than one planet, explains Jack Lissauer (NASA’s Ames Research Center). Then they used a technique called verification by multiplicity, which relies in part on the logic of probability.
The blue bars on the histogram represents all the exoplanets known, by size, before today’s Kepler Planet Bonanza announcement on Feb. 26, 2014. The gold bars on the histogram represent Kepler’s newly-verified planets.
Sizes of Verified Planets found by Kepler – boosted significantly by today’s announcement
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