Research Paper On Exoplanets

One of the most extraordinary scientific discoveries in astronomy has been the findings of exoplanets- planets that orbit stars outside of our solar system. In 1992, Aleksander Wolszczan and Dale Frail announced their discovery of two exoplanets orbiting around a pulsar that was 1,000 light years away from Earth. Then, in 1995, Michel Mayor and Didier Queloz discovered the first exoplanet that orbited a star like our sun- 51 Pegasi b (Encrenaz, 2014). These discoveries led to a hunt for exoplanets- with thousands being discovered to date. Exoplanets are difficult to discover. They’re several light years away and generally orbit a star that is bigger and brighter. Despite these obstacles, astronomers have developed several different methods

A common method used today is the Doppler Effect. An orbiting planet will cause the star to ‘wobble’ which causes a shift in the visible light emitted from the star (Sasselov, 2008). Gravitational lensing is another common technique used for discovering exoplanets. For this method to work, another star or another source of light needs to be behind the star being investigated. As the star is being observed, the background star’s light will be bent by the gravity of the observed star; and if there is an orbiting planet, this effect will be altered in a different way (Sasselov, 2008). The most successful technique in discovering exoplanets is the transiting method. In this method, the exoplanet passes directly in front of its host star, which causes a mini-eclipse. These mini-eclipses are detected by telescopes that can track the brightness of these stars (Heng & Winn, 2015). These

In 1990, Carl Sagan prompted the Voyager 1 crew to take a photo of Earth. Sagan likened the picture to “a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.” (Belikov & Bendek, 2015). There are billions of stars in our Milky Way galaxy alone, so it’s possible for there to be other planets like our home. The findings of a planet like ours could revolutionize how life on our planet was formed. As technology increases, astronomers will be able to better observe a planet’s atmosphere and surface composition, which could find an Earth-like planet. The search for extraterrestrial worlds is one the most fundamental and noble pursuits of astronomy. The findings of these planets would launch us into our greatest astronomic achievement: the exploration of interstellar worlds beyond our home solar