NASA - National Aeronautics and Space Administration

Kepler Data Release
William Borucki, Principal Investigator
Read his biography.
Download his slides from Feb. 2, 2011 (v2)

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Kepler's planet candidates by size.
Image credit: NASA/Wendy Stenzel

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Kepler's planet candidates.
Image credit: NASA/Wendy Stenzel


The Kepler instrument views 1/400th of the sky. Imagine how many more planets there might be if we expand Kepler's field-of-view to look at the rest of the galaxy?
Animation credit: NASA/Bill Moede


Kepler-11
Jack Lassauer, Co-Investigator
Read his biography.
Download his slides from Feb. 2, 2011 (19MB pdf)

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Kepler-11 is a sun-like star around which six planets orbit. At times, two or more planets pass in front of the star at once, as shown in this artist's conception of a simultaneous transit of three planets observed by NASA's Kepler spacecraft on Aug. 26, 2010.
Image credit: NASA/Tim Pyle

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This artist’s conception shows the Kepler-11 planetary system and our solar system from a tilted perspective to demonstrate that the orbits of each lie on similar planes.
Image credit: NASA/Tim Pyle

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Kepler's candidates of multi-planet systems.
Image credit: NASA/Tim Pyle

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Kepler's planets displayed by size comparison.
Image credit: NASA/Wendy Stenzel


NASA's Kepler space telescope watches a star, Kepler-11. The star appears to blink in a pattern. It dims like clockwork as six "hands" of differing size orbit around it at different rates. Kepler-11 dims when its six orbiting planets cross between it and the Kepler spacecraft. Calculations show the planets are nested in circular orbits that lie in almost the same plane.
Animation credit: NASA/Tim Pyle