NASA confirmed that 5,000 exoplanets are cosmic milestones
What does a planet beyond the solar system look like — an exoplanet? This picture shows a wide variety of planets. Scientists discovered the first exoplanet in the 1990s. NASA has just confirmed a new planet, and now there are now a total of 5,000 exoplanets and the number is increasing.
This article was originally published by NASA/Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) on March 21, 2022. This is a big day for astronomers who study exoplanets and orbit the world around distant planets. The Milky Way is home to 1 billion distant planets, and to date, through the efforts of countless researchers, scientists have confirmed the existence of 5,000 exoplanets in the Milky Way. Such as Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune in the solar system... These planets are unique and interesting.
5,000 exoplanets
Not so long ago, mankind only knew a few planets in the universe, all of which orbited the sun. But a large number of new discoveries have reached the high point of scientific exploration: on March 21, 2022, scientists confirmed the existence of more than 5,000 planets in the solar system.
The planetary odometer opened on March 21, and the latest batch of 65 exoplanets— planets outside our immediate solar family — were added to NASA's exoplanet archives. The dossier documents exoplanet discoveries that appear in peer-reviewed scientific papers and has been confirmed using multiple exploration methods or analytical techniques.
The more than 5,000 planets discovered so far include small rocky worlds like Earth, gas giants many times larger than Jupiter, and hot Jupiters orbiting other stars. Super-Earths, possibly rocky worlds larger than our own, and Mini Neptune, are smaller versions of our system Neptune. Add to that synthetic planets orbiting two planets at the same time and planets stubbornly orbiting the collapsed remnants of dead stars.
Astronomers have discovered more than five thousand exoplanets, or planets outside our solar system. And that's just one part of the hundreds of promising exoplanets in our galaxy. The discovery of exoplanets radiates from Earth in a cone like spokes on a wheel. More discoveries await us.
Numbered world: 5,000 exoplanets and unknown
The archive's scientific director, Jessie Christiansen, a research scientist at NASA's Exoplanet Research Institute at the California Institute of Technology, said
It's not just a number. Every number is a new world, a whole new world. Because we're so excited that they don't know yet.
We do know this: Our galaxy seems to contain millions of planets. In 1992, when a new world orbited a stranger planet, people began to constantly publicize such discoveries. It's a neutron star called a pulsar, a fast-spinning remnant of a star that pulses in the milliseconds of searing heat. Measuring pulses that vary slightly over time allowed scientists to discover planetary orbits around pulsars.
The discovery of only three planets orbiting such pulsars opened the door to exploration, and the lead author of the article published the first exoplanet that could be confirmed three decades ago, said Wolszczan:
If you can spot a planet around a neutron star, wonder if planets are almost everywhere. The process of planet creation is very robust and robust
Wolszczan, who is also a professor at Penn State University for the study of exoplanets, says we've opened up a new era of no longer just adding newly discovered planets to the list. Launched in 2018, the TESS transit exoplanet survey satellite continues to explore new exoplanets. But soon a new generation of stronger telescopes and highly sensitive instruments will launch the James Webb Space Telescope in the near future, which will capture the light emitted from exoplanetary galaxies and read the gas in them to identify potential signs of habitability.
Search for more telescopes
The Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope, which will launch in 2027, will use a variety of new methods to observe exoplanets. The European Space Agency will launch ARIEL in 2029 to facilitate the mission of observing the atmosphere of exoplanets. NASA's international technology, called CASE, will also help us observe nebulae outside the department.
Wolszczan said:
It seems to me that it is inevitable that we may find some kind of life somewhere.
He added that the chemical composition of life on Earth is closely linked to some of the chemical components found in the universe, and the detection of a wide range of organic molecules suggest that the discovery of other life is itself a matter of time.
In this video, the exoplanets discovered over the past decade are represented by musical notes. The circle indicates the position and size of his orbit, and the color represents the different detection methods. The bass notes represent long tracks, while the treble notes represent short tracks.
How do I find other worlds?
The view is not always so bright. In 1995, the first planet discovered around a sun-like star was confirmed to be a hot Jupiter: a gas giant with a mass of about half that of Jupiter, orbiting its star for a period of 4 days. That is, a "year" of the planet is only four days. Since astronomers learned to identify such planets, more and more such planets have been recorded in ground-based telescope data: first dozens, then hundreds. They were discovered through the "wobble" method: the slight back-and-forth motion of stars that track orbiting planets causing traction. However, no signs of habitability have been found on these planets.
The search for a small rocky world like The Earth requires a major leap forward in exoplanet search technology , the Transit Method. Astronomer Willianm Borucki came up with an idea: to connect its sensitive light detector to a telescope and then launch it into space. The telescope will stare for years in the field of view of more than 170,000 planets, looking for tiny signs of starlight decline as planets pass through the star's surface.
This vision was realized through the Kepler Space Telescope.
Brocki, the now retired Kepler mission principal investigator, said the Kepler space telescope launched in 2009 opened a new window into the universe.
He said: "I have a real sense of satisfaction and awe for everything in the universe. We didn't expect so many kinds of planetary systems and stars. It's amazing!
5,000 exoplanets: an infographic
So far, the more than 5,000 exoplanets that have been confirmed in the Milky Way contain various types of planets: some of them are like some of the planets in our solar system, and most of them are still different. Among them are mysterious planets that are larger and more rocky than Earth, and they are called "super-Earths". Image from NASA/JPL-Caltech.
Finally, NASA/JPL announced on March 21, 2022, that the number of confirmed exoplanets has just over 5,000, and that's it
A 30-year journey of discovery.
BY：EarthSky Voices
FY：Astronomical volunteer team
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