Sentences with phrase «telltale dips»
Kepler watched sunlike stars for telltale dips in brightness that would reveal a passing planet.
sciencenews.org
To find them, the team analyzed light data from thousands of stars, looking for telltale dips indicating that a planet may periodically pass in front of a star.
After reaching its orbit in about two months, the telescope will start scanning nearby stars telltale dips in light that signal a passing planet.
It searches for tiny, telltale dips in a star's brightness caused when a planet transits — or crosses in front of — the star from Earth's perspective, blocking a fraction of the star's light.
Transit surveys stare at stars, watching for the telltale dip in brightness that occurs when an orbiting planet passes in front and blots out a tiny bit of light.
Kepler detects planets through «transits,» watching for the telltale dips in starlight caused by the shadows of worlds that happen to periodically flit across the faces of their stars as seen from Earth.
After all, if a planet's orbit never allows it to pass between Earth and its stars, no telltale dip in starlight will ever point to the planet's existence.
If his team hadn't been watching the stars at just the right moment, the scientists would have missed the telltale dip in light that signaled the presence of this planet.
The spacecraft will spend a minimum of two years patiently searching 200,000 stars all across the sky for the telltale dips in light that tell astronomers that there are planets transiting those stars.