14 DAY TRIAL // Officials at the American space agency announce that their Kepler planet-hunting telescope managed to send back no less than 706 potential hits in its quest for alien worlds. These readings have not yet been confirmed as exoplanets. However, if they are, then it means that Kepler managed to nearly triple the number of known exoplanets in one fell swoop. At this point, astronomers have only validated the existence of 461 planets orbiting stars outside the solar system. Astronomers are currently analyzing the Kepler data in detail, to see which of the datasets turns out to actually refer to a planet, Space reports.
“This is the most precise, nearly continuous, longest and largest data set of stellar photometry ever. The results will only get better as the duration of the data set grows with time,” the deputy principal investigator of the Kepler mission, David Koch, explains in a statement. The expert holds an appointment at the Moffett Field, California-based NASA Ames Research Center. He adds that the patch of sky Kepler was in charge of investigating features no less than 156,000 stars. Even so, it only covers a minute part of the entire night sky, so undoubtedly the number of existing exoplanets is a lot larger.
“For the most interesting objects, we go through a process of putting the data through a series of sieves. For final candidates that have passed all the tests, we then go to the expensive resources like Hubble and Spitzer,” Kepler's deputy project manager, Charles Sobeck, says. Generally, when it comes to determining the accuracy of discoveries related to exoplanets, the initial datasets need to be confirmed through a variety of other measurements, including photos snapped by other telescopes. “I look forward to the scientific community analyzing the data and announcing new exoplanet results in the coming months,” NASA Headquarters Kepler program executive Lia LaPiana adds. The follow-up data on the 706 objects of interest will be presented to the world in February 2011.
“The Kepler observations will tell us whether there are many stars with planets that could harbor life, or whether we might be alone in our galaxy. We never thought we'd have this much this early, it's absolutely wonderful. The instruments are working well, but we still have some work to do. We're certainly not finished with this kind of work, and each year, we go to more and more difficult targets. So, people have to be patient,” Ames expert William Borucki, who is the principal scientific investigator for the mission, concludes.