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Space

Have we just found thousands of planets outside our galaxy?

By John Wenz

6 February 2018

Âé¶¹´«Ã½. Science news and long reads from expert journalists, covering developments in science, technology, health and the environment on the website and the magazine.

Home to thousands of planets?

NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory and the Hubble Space Telescope

We may have just seen solid evidence for thousands of planets outside the Milky Way. It would be the first glimpse of planets outside our galaxy.

These traces were found with the help of gravitational lensing, which happens when an object magnifies the light of something more distant, making it appear larger to telescopes. The quasar RX J1131‑1231, a galactic nucleus surrounded by a ring of gas and dust, has a well observed rotation rate thanks to this effect. But the spectra of light…

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