Spotting TIC 231949697 b: The Transit Method

July 22, 2026

Spotting TIC 231949697 b: The Transit Method

How do you find a planet you can never see? Astronomers used clever tricks with starlight to spot TIC 231949697 b, a scorching rocky world 164 light-years away. Find out how tiny dips in brightness led to one of science's coolest discoveries.

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Finding Planets

June 28, 2026

How Did We Find TOI-5734 b?

Scientists found a scorching hot world called TOI-5734 b orbiting a star 106 light-years away — and they did it without ever taking a single photo of the planet. Find out how two clever methods helped crack the case.

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Could Kepler-991 b Be Friendly to Life?
Kepler-991 b is a planet more than 1,200 light-years away that scientists discovered in 2016. It's bigger than Earth, orbits a calm orange star, and has a temperature that might not rule out life — but there's still a lot we don't know.
TOI-1718 b: A New World Around TOI-1718
TOI-1718 b is a scorching hot planet nearly four times wider than Earth, racing around its star in less than six days. It belongs to a type of world that doesn't exist in our solar system — and scientists are just beginning to uncover its secrets.
How Long Would It Take to Reach Gl 725 A b?
Gl 725 A b is one of the closest exoplanets to Earth, but even at 11.5 light-years away, it would take our fastest spacecraft about 209,000 years to get there. Find out what that distance really means and what we know about this nearby world.
HD 85426 c: Getting to Know a Mini-Neptune
HD 85426 c is a faraway world bigger than Earth but smaller than Neptune, and scientists have already figured out some surprising things about it. Find out what it might be made of, how hot it gets, and why this planet is such a great example of how space science works.
Inside TOI-178: A Family of 6 Planets
About 205 light-years away, a cool orange star is home to six planets packed tightly together and moving in a perfectly timed rhythm. This amazing system breaks many rules scientists expected — and it has a lot to teach us about how planetary families form.