(Belga) More than five thousand so-called exoplanets have now been discovered outside our solar system. That line was crossed Monday, when 65 newly found planets were confirmed and added to the survey by the US space agency NASA.
The first exoplanet was found in 1992. The counter now stands at 5,005 confirmed planets orbiting stars other than the sun. Some are small and rock-like like Earth, and other exoplanets are gas giants, much larger than Jupiter. There are also planets that revolve around two stars. In addition, there are thousands of potential planets. Scientists have picked up signals and suspect that those exoplanets exist, but there is no definitive and conclusive proof yet. The actual number of planets in the universe will be much higher. In our Milky Way alone there are at least 100 billion stars and there are hundreds of billions of galaxies like the Milky Way. All those stars in all those systems can have planets with them. Our solar system has eight planets: Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune. (Belgium)
The first exoplanet was found in 1992. The counter now stands at 5,005 confirmed planets orbiting stars other than the sun. Some are small and rock-like like Earth, and other exoplanets are gas giants, much larger than Jupiter. There are also planets that revolve around two stars. In addition, there are thousands of potential planets. Scientists have picked up signals and suspect that those exoplanets exist, but there is no definitive and conclusive proof yet. The actual number of planets in the universe will be much higher. In our Milky Way alone there are at least 100 billion stars and there are hundreds of billions of galaxies like the Milky Way. All those stars in all those systems can have planets with them. Our solar system has eight planets: Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune. (Belgium)
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