Topic: Mass Transits: Kepler Mission Releases Data on Hundreds of Possible Exoplanets

[sam]

The Kepler spacecraft, launched in 2009 to scour distant stellar systems for Earth-like planets, has yet to attain that lofty goal, but it is now returning a flood of data about all manner of planets outside the solar system. On June 15, the Kepler team released information on possible planets identified in the first month or so of the spacecraft's three-plus-year mission—a massive set of more than 300 candidates that promises to significantly augment the known catalogue of extrasolar planets. The data were published online at the preprint repository arXiv.org and will be submitted to The Astrophysical Journal.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=kepler-planets-700

-- good stuff!!!

[Clive]

Oh yes!  It's going to identify a lot of new planets for us.