An artist's illustration of Kepler-35 b, a Saturn-size planet around a pair of sun-size stars, as envisioned by artist Lynette Cook. The discovery of Kepler-35b and another twin sun planet, Kepler-34 b, was announced Jan. 11, 2012 and represent a new class of circumbinary planets.
An artist's illustration of Kepler-35 b, a Saturn-size planet around a pair of sun-size stars, as envisioned by artist Mark A. Garlick. The discovery of Kepler-35b and another twin sun planet, Kepler-34 b, was announced Jan. 11, 2012 and represent a new class of circumbinary planets.
An artist's illustration of Kepler-35 b, a Saturn-size planet around a pair of sun-size stars, as envisioned by artist Lior Taylor. The discovery of Kepler-35b and another twin sun planet, Kepler-34 b, was announced Jan. 11, 2012 and represent a new class of circumbinary planets.
This artist's concept illustrates Kepler-16b, the first planet known to definitively orbit two stars -- a real-life Tatooine, from 'Star Wars.' The planet, which can be seen in the foreground, was discovered by NASA's Kepler mission.
NASA's Kepler mission has discovered a world where two suns set over the horizon instead of just one. The planet, called Kepler-16b, is not thought to be habitable. It is a cold world, with a gaseous surface, and it circles two stars, just like "Star Wars" Tatooine.
This artist's concept illustrates the Kepler-16 system (white) from an overhead view, showing its planet Kepler-16b and the eccentric orbits of the two stars it circles (labeled A and B). For reference, the orbits of our own solar system's planets Mercury and Earth are shown in blue.
Film still from 'Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope' showing the sunset on the planet Tatooine.
NASA's Kepler mission is searching for Earth-like planets by looking for them to cross the face of alien stars.
This is Kepler's field of view superimposed on the night sky.
This star chart illustrates the large patch of sky that NASA's Kepler mission will stare at for the duration of its three-and-a-half-year lifetime. The planet hunter's full field of view occupies 100 square degrees of our Milky Way galaxy, in the constellations Cygnus and Lyra.
A visible graphic of the 1,235 planets Kepler announced last winter. Over 350 planets ranked as "Earth size" or "Super Earths."
Comparative sizes of planets discovered by Kepler. Jupiter, Neptune and Earth are shown for comparison as well. "RE" in the diagram means size relative to Earth or RE = Radius of the planet in Earth radii.
Chart showing temperatures and relative sizes of the Kepler planets that have been discovered.
An artist's interpretation of the Kepler observatory in space.
An artist's illustration of the extrasolar planets discovered around the star Kepler 11 by NASA's Kepler Space Telescope.
Luke Skywalker’s home planet of Tatooine in Star Wars had two suns, but that’s paltry compared to a Jupiter-like planet 149 light-years from Earth. This planet has three suns, with the main star similar in mass to our own sun. The triple-star system is known as HD 188753. Like Tatooine, the planet there is likely pretty hot – it orbits very close to the main star, completing one orbit every 3.5 days.
