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NASA’s Kepler Telescope was instrumental in discovering many exoplanets and did a fairly good job
Kepler Space Telescope
- Scientists have discovered more than 100 new exoplanets using NASA Kepler Space telescope data and ground-based observatories. The diverse planets are expected to play a large role in developing the research field of exoplanets and life in the Universe.
- The Kepler Space Telescope has been officially retired by NASA. Its successor space telescope, called TESS, has already started collecting data.
- The Kepler mission, launched in 2009, is specifically designed to explore our Milky Way galaxy region to find hundreds of Earth-sized and smaller planets in or near the habitable area and estimate the fraction of the hundreds of billions of stars in our galaxy that may have these planets.