Finding extrasolar planets is quite difficult mainly because of three basic facts: planets don't produce any light of their own; they are far from us; and they are lost in the blinding glare of their parent stars. But now, NASA engineers have found a way to eliminate this blinding light, and this is "a giant step toward finding Earth-like planets." At Hawaii's Keck Observatory in Mauna Kea, they used the Interferometer, which links the observatory's two telescopes, and they blocked starlight by adding an instrument called a "nuller." For example, they reduced the blinding light of Vega by 100 times. This will help NASA to select targets for its future SIM PlanetQuest mission, scheduled to launch in 2011, and its two Terrestrial Planet Finder observatories, which should be launched in 2016 and 2019. Will NASA find life somewhere in the universe? Maybe not, but it will be easy to find other planets. Read more...
Sources: NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, September 29, 2005; and NASA's PlanetQuest web site
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