For the first time, citizen scientists have discovered a system of at least five exoplanets through a project known as Exoplanet Explorers.
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The project is a part of an online platform called Zooniverse and the finding has been made using data from NASA's Kepler Space Telescope.
This multi-planet system was discovered completely through crowdsourcing. The Astronomical Journal has published a study describing the system.
In 2017, the project Exoplanet Explorers was launched and the data accumulated by Kepler was processed by citizen scientists.
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This finding was also featured on a program Stargazing Live on the Australia Broadcasting Corporation (ABC). On the final night of the three-day program, the researchers had announced the discovery of a four-planet system which was dubbed K2-138. They were sure that the planet system also had a fifth planet or even a sixth, according to a NASA statement.
Another batch of 2017 data from Kepler was uploaded to the project Exoplanet Explorers for the citizen scientists to examine and analyse. They are yet to go through most of it for planets.
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The parent star of this multi-planet system was found to be a bit smaller and cooler than our Sun. The size of the planets in this exoplanet system is between that of Earth and Neptune. Planet b is likely to be potentially rocky while other planets –c, d, e and f are likely to contain ice and gas in huge amounts. These planets are also found to have an orbital period which is shorter than 13 days. They are extremely hot and have a temperature ranging from 800 to 1,800 degrees Fahrenheit.
NASA is planning to hunt for alien life in an interstellar space flight in 2069. According to the reports, this will be an unmanned mission and is yet to be named. Also, the technology required to build a spacecraft that can search for life outside our solar system is yet to be developed.
