Astronomers have discovered four new planets in a week's time, an exciting end-of-summer flurry that signals a sharper era in the hunt for new worlds.
While none of these new bodies would be mistaken as Earth's twin, some appear to be noticeably smaller and more solid — more like Earth and Mars — than the gargantuan, gaseous giants identified before.
Planet-hunting is the hottest field in astronomy, with hundreds of researchers joining a race that just a decade ago was reserved for a few dreamers. This past week has been a dizzying one with three teams in the United States and Europe rushing to announce their discoveries of new exoplanets — those orbiting stars other than our sun.
Today, NASA was expected to cap the excitement with details on what the space agency describes as a "new class" of exoplanets found by one of the American teams, led by University of California-Berkeley astronomer Geoffrey Marcy.
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