blow for exoplanet research. The U.S. space telescope Kepler has increased the discovery of new planets since 2009, is paralyzed by a technical problem that could spell the premature end of his four-year mission, NASA said Wednesday.
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Kepler is blocked by the malfunction of a mechanism that allows the telescope to a given point in the sky towards said John Grunsfeld, the head of the science division of the U.S. space agency. “The telescope was put into safe mode” to ensure that the solar panels facing the sun to recharge the batteries and continue to communicate with Earth, he said.
not send astronauts
engineers found last week that the gyroscope was not moving despite orders from the ground. This problem had already occurred in July with another gyro Kepler has stopped working, said the head of NASA.
“Unfortunately Kepler is not a place where you can send astronauts” to fix it, he said, explaining that the engineers ‘carefully examined the data (…) to see s’ it is possible to resume the scientific activities of the telescope. ” But “we are not yet ready to declare the end of Kepler,” insisted John Grunsfeld, arguing that “in all respects the Kepler mission was a success.”
2,740 potential exoplanets
Kepler is the first telescope dedicated to the search for planets sisters of the Earth in other solar systems in our galaxy, the Milky Way. So far it has detected 2,740 potential exoplanets which 122 were confirmed to the day using telescopes and other equipment.
In April, astronauts had announced the discovery by Kepler, two exoplanets with the greatest similarity to Earth ever recorded and where water could remain liquid and potentially allow the life of exist. Kepler – Mission $ 600 million in total – was launched in 2009 to scan for at least four years over 100,000 stars like our Sun, located in the constellation Cygnus and Lyra in the Milky Way
D.C. with AFP
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