December 21, 2011
Astronomers from NASA’s Kepler spacecraft announced Tuesday that they had discovered a pair of planets the size of Earth orbiting a distant star. The new planets, one about as big as Earth and the other slightly smaller than Venus, are the smallest yet found beyond the solar system. Harvard Astronomy Professor David Charbonneau was a member of the team that made the observations, led by his colleague Francois Fressin.
Image credit: NASA/Ames/JPL-Caltech