NASA discovers 2 new planets
August 27th, 2010 - 7:36 pm ICT by Aishwarya Bhatt
Washington DC, Aug 27 (THAINDIAN NEWS) NASA with the aid of its Kepler Space Telescope has detected two exoplanets that are shaped like Saturn, and they are crossing in front of a single star.
NASA also says the telescope discovered what appears to be a third planet though that has not been confirmed like the first two. NASA has named the two planets Kepler- 9b and Kepler-9c.
The third observation needs to be studied by NASA further to determine whether it is another planet or an astronomical phenomenon that is capable of mimicking a planet from distance away. It has been named Kepler-9 and it is 2000 light years away from Earth. Kepler-9 is about 1.5 times the radius of planet Earth and it is 1.6-day orbit near the sun.
With the other two confirmed planets, Kepler-9b and Kepler-9c, Kepler-9b seemed to be the biggest of the two with a mass that is less but similar to that of Saturn. It lies closest to its host star with an orbit of 19.2 days. Kepler-9c however has an orbit of 36 days to the host star and after further analysis, the exact time between the two planets could be determined.
NASA says they have been studying the planets for a period of seven months now.
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Tags: 9b, astronomical phenomenon, exact time, exoplanets, host star, kepler, light years, nasa, new planets, observation, orbit, planet earth, radius, saturn, seven months, space telescope, sun, third planet, washington dc