More than 5,000 planets have been confirmed to exist outside the solar system, marking a milestone in the history of astronomy, NASA said Monday.
The more than 5,000 planets discovered to date include small, rocky worlds like Earth, gas giants much larger than Jupiter, and “hot Jupiters” orbiting so close to their star, according to NASA.
The existence of these exoplanets has been confirmed using multiple detection methods or analytical techniques.
According to NASA, next-generation powerful telescopes and their extremely sensitive instruments, the first of which is the recently launched James Webb Space Telescope, will capture the light produced by the atmospheres of exoplanets, as well as analyze what gases are there. present and thus potentially identify signs of habitable conditions.
“It’s not just a number,” said Jessie Christiansen, chief scientist of the archive and a researcher with NASA’s Institute for Exoplanet Science at Caltech in Pasadena. “Each of them is a new world, a unique planet. I get excited about each of them because we don’t know anything about them.”