Alien Planets

A high school junior found a distant planet that orbits two stars, one of just a dozen such worlds known to scientists.

A tiny satellite studying alien worlds may be gone for good, but during the two years the spacecraft operated, it laid the foundation for what may become a new way of finding exoplanets.

Astronomers have spotted another possible planet orbiting Proxima Centauri, which lies just 4.2 light-years from the sun.

Astronomers have found two more potentially life-supporting alien planets in our neck of the cosmic woods, as well as a weird and record-setting 'cold Neptune.'

One of our solar system's fundamental boundaries may have existed since the very beginning, a new study reports.

When scientists search for alien planets, they get a special thrill when they find one that seems to reflect our own world back to us.

A new approach to detecting oxygen in the atmospheres of other planets may aid in the search for life beyond Earth.

TOI 700 d is a landmark discovery for NASA's Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite.

Three Nobel Prize laureates gathered to talk about the universe with none other than two Expedition 61 astronauts orbiting Earth: NASA's Jessica Meir, and Italy's Luca Parmitano.

Water appears both common and unexpectedly scarce in exoplanets — many distant worlds have it, but less of it than predicted, a new study finds.

As the 2010s come to a close, it's time to revisit how some of the biggest space science stories shaped the decade.

From a world with three suns in its sky to lots of possibly habitable real estate, the past year has seen some incredible exoplanet discoveries. Here are 10 of the most memorable.

A new exoplanet mission took to the skies early this morning (Dec. 18), on a quest to better understand the metrics of distant worlds.

What do Van Gogh's "Starry Night," traditional Ethiopian coffee ceremonies and a river in Alaska have in common? All are now commemorated in the solar systems around ours.

A European exoplanet-hunting satellite is set to soar into space on Tuesday, along with a few other satellites. Here's how you can watch live.

The European launch provider Arianespace postponed the launch of a new spacecraft designed to hunt alien planets and four other satellites today (Dec 17) due to a glitch with the mission's rocket.

As finding alien worlds has gotten easier, learning every single detail scientists can has become, perhaps surprisingly, a bit of a waste of the precious time of instruments and computers alike.

Using artificial intelligence could aid in the search for life and detection of nearby asteroids.

Scientists have caught their best-ever look at a comet belching out ice, dust and gas — and the observations came courtesy of a mission designed to hunt for alien worlds.