It showcases just how good Kepler was at planet hunting, even at the end of its life.”Ī paper about the planetary trio led by Incha was published in the issue of the journal Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. “But they’re exciting because Kepler observed them during its last few days of operations. ''These are fairly average planets in the grand scheme of Kepler observations,” said Elyse Incha, a senior at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. The trio of exoplanets – worlds beyond our solar system – are all between the size of Earth and Neptune and closely orbit their stars. Walbolt)Ī team of astrophysicists and citizen scientists have identified what may be some of the last planets NASA’s retired Kepler space telescope observed during its nearly decade-long mission. A research team worked with a group of citizen scientists and professional astronomers and found three planets in the last bit of data. In the end, astronomers only had about seven days of high-quality data.
As the spacecraft began to run low on attitude control fuel, it couldn’t maintain its position long enough to collect useful observations. The final observing campaign of NASA's Kepler Space Telescope lasted only a month.
