MIT aims to search for Earth-like planets with Google's help

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An artists representation of a proposed satellite that would be used to view distant planets. A planet is transiting a star in the background. Image courtesy TESS Team
An artist's representation of a proposed satellite that would be used to view distant planets. A planet is transiting a star in the background. Image courtesy / TESS Team

MIT scientists are designing a satellite-based observatory that they say could for the first time provide a sensitive survey of the entire sky to search for planets outside the solar system that appear to cross in front of bright stars. The system could rapidly discover hundreds of planets similar to the Earth.


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All News summaries for March 21, 2008

A new era in search for 'sister Earths'?

6 hours ago | User rating: not rated yet
Research presented at a recent astronomical conference is being hailed as ushering in a new era in the search for Earth-like planets by showing that they are more numerous than previously thought and that ...

'Impressionist' Spacecraft to View Solar System's Invisible Frontier

7 hours ago | User rating: not rated yet
(PhysOrg.com) -- At the edge of our solar system in December 2004, the Voyager 1 spacecraft encountered something never before experienced during its then 26-year cruise through the solar system — an invisible ...

NASA Successfully Tests Parachute for Ares Rocket

7 hours ago | User rating: not rated yet
(PhysOrg.com) -- NASA and industry engineers have successfully completed the first drop test of a drogue parachute for the Ares I rocket. The drogue parachute is designed to slow the rapid descent of the spent first-stage ...

Partial Solar Eclipse visible from the UK on the morning of 1st August

12 hours ago | User rating: not rated yet
On 1st August 2008 there will be a total eclipse of the Sun, visible from Canada, northern Greenland, Svalbard, the Barents Sea, Russia, Mongolia and China. From the whole of the British Isles observers will see a partial ...

Rising energy, food prices major threats to wetlands as farmers eye new areas for crops

Jul 25, 2008 | User rating: not rated yet
Critical food shortages and growing demand for bio-fuels and hydro-electricity due to high fossil fuel prices rank among the greatest threats today to the preservation of precious wetlands worldwide as farmers and developers ...
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