Using the now-retired Kepler space telescope, astronomers have discovered that larger planets grow up in more turbulent homes than smaller worlds.

This orbit would enable Kepler to keep itself trained on the specific point in the sky that had been chosen for its studies. On April 7, 2009 the telescope cover was jettisoned and Kepler achieved ...

Operating under this principle, Kepler looks for disruption in the light from a star which can indicate that there’s a planet in orbit around it. With careful observation it’s possible to ...

It does this by detecting slight drops in the brightness of stars, signaling the presence of one or more planets hanging out in orbit. Kepler has spotted many new worlds during its mission ...

Keep your eye on the ball” is a motto for many athletes—and for astronomers trying to find Earth-threatening space rocks ...

Planets change orbit shape around Neptune’s size. Metal-rich stars help giant planets form. Eccentric orbits suggest chaotic planet formation.

To see this, recall the definition of angular momentum: Kepler's second law states that the area swept out by the line connecting the satellite to the Earth's center over a given time Δt is a constant ...

The main reason why orbits are drawn as ellipses in textbooks is to demonstrate Kepler's second law. If the orbit of the Earth was drawn as shown in the correctly scaled diagram it would be ...

Moreover, with truly prescient insight, Kepler suggested that the planets were kept in orbit by a force emanating from the sun itself. This radical idea was eventually demonstrated by Isaac ...

Together with precise optical ranging between selected satellites, this provides orbit determination capabilities with unprecedented accuracy. The Kepler infrastructure thus consists of three main ...