title: Henry Flagler

text: Standard Oil gradually gained almost complete control of oil refining and marketing in the United States through horizontal integration. In the kerosene industry, Standard Oil replaced the old distribution system with its own vertical system. It supplied kerosene by tank cars that brought the fuel to local markets, and tank wagons then delivered to retail customers, thus bypassing the existing network of wholesale jobbers. Despite improving the quality and availability of kerosene products while greatly reducing their cost to the public (the price of kerosene dropped by nearly 80% over the life of the company), Standard Oil's business practices created intense controversy. Standard's most potent weapons against competitors were underselling, differential pricing, and secret transportation rebates. The firm was attacked by journalists and politicians throughout its existence, in part for these monopolistic methods, giving momentum to the antitrust movement. By 1880, according to the "New York World", Standard Oil was "the most cruel, impudent, pitiless, and grasping monopoly that ever fastened upon a country." To the critics Flagler and Rockefeller replied, "In a business so large as ours... some things are likely to be done which we cannot approve. We correct them as soon as they come to our knowledge."


title: Henry Flagler

text: At that time, many legislatures had made it difficult to incorporate in one state and operate in another. As a result, Flagler and Rockefeller and their associates owned dozens of separate corporations, each of which operated in just one state; the management of the whole enterprise was rather unwieldy. In 1882, Flagler and Rockefeller's lawyers created an innovative form of corporation to centralize their holdings, giving birth to the Standard Oil Trust. The "trust" was a corporation of corporations, and the entity's size and wealth drew much attention. Nine trustees, including Rockefeller, ran the 41 companies in the trust. The public and the press were immediately suspicious of this new legal entity, and other businesses seized upon the idea and emulated it, further inflaming public sentiment. Standard Oil had gained an aura of invincibility, always prevailing against competitors, critics, and political enemies. It had become the richest, biggest, most feared business in the world, seemingly immune to the boom and bust of the business cycle, consistently racking up profits year after year.


title: Henry Flagler

text: Its vast American empire included 20,000 domestic wells, 4,000 miles of pipeline, 5,000 tank cars, and over 100,000 employees. Its share of world oil refining topped out above 90% but slowly dropped to about 80% for the rest of the century. In spite of the formation of the trust and its perceived immunity from all competition, by the 1880s Standard Oil had passed its peak of power over the world oil market. Flagler and Rockefeller finally gave up their dream of controlling all the world's oil refining. Rockefeller admitted later, "We realized that public sentiment would be against us if we actually refined all the oil." Over time foreign competition and new finds abroad eroded his dominance. In the early 1880s, Flagler and Rockefeller created one of their most important innovations. Rather than try to influence the price of crude oil directly, Standard Oil had been exercising indirect control by altering oil storage charges to suit market conditions. Flagler and Rockefeller then decided to issue certificates against oil stored in Standard Oil's pipelines. These certificates became traded by speculators, thus creating the first oil-futures market which effectively set spot market prices from then on. The National Petroleum Exchange opened in Manhattan in late 1882 to facilitate the oil futures trading.


title: Henry Flagler

text: Even though 85% of world crude production was still coming from Pennsylvania wells in the 1880s, overseas drilling in Russia and Asia began to reach the world market. Robert Nobel had established his own refining enterprise in the abundant and cheaper Russian oil fields, including the region's first pipeline and the world's first oil tanker. The Paris Rothschilds jumped into the fray providing financing. Additional fields were discovered in Burma and Java. Even more critical, the invention of the light bulb gradually began to erode the dominance of kerosene for illumination. But Standard Oil adapted, developing its own European presence, expanding into natural gas production in the U.S., then into gasoline for automobiles, which until then had been considered a waste product.


title: Henry Flagler

text: Standard Oil moved its headquarters to New York City, at 26 Broadway, and Flagler and Rockefeller became central figures in the city's business community.


title: Henry Flagler

text: In 1887, Congress created the Interstate Commerce Commission, which was tasked with enforcing equal rates for all railroad freight, but by then Standard depended more on pipeline transport. More threatening to Standard's power was the Sherman Antitrust Act of 1890, originally used to control unions, but later central to the breakup of the Standard Oil trust. Ohio was especially vigorous in applying its state anti-trust laws, and finally forced a separation of Standard Oil of Ohio from the rest of the company in 1892, the first step in the dissolution of the trust.


title: Henry Flagler

text: Upon his ascent to the presidency, Theodore Roosevelt initiated dozens of suits under the Sherman Antitrust Act and coaxed reforms out of Congress. In 1901, U.S. Steel, now controlled by J. Pierpont Morgan, having bought Andrew Carnegie's steel assets, offered to buy Standard's iron interests as well. A deal brokered by Henry Clay Frick exchanged Standard's iron interests for U.S. Steel stock and gave Rockefeller and his son membership on the company's board of directors.


title: Henry Flagler

text: One of the most effective attacks on Flagler and Rockefeller and their firm was the 1905 publication of "The History of the Standard Oil Company," by Ida Tarbell, a leading muckraker. She documented the company's espionage, price wars, heavy-handed marketing tactics, and courtroom evasions. Although her work prompted a huge backlash against the company, Tarbell claims to have been surprised at its magnitude. "I never had an animus against their size and wealth, never objected to their corporate form. I was willing that they should combine and grow as big and wealthy as they could, but only by legitimate means. But they had never played fair, and that ruined their greatness for me." Tarbell's father had been driven out of the oil business during the South Improvement Company affair.


title: Henry Flagler

text: Flagler and Rockefeller began a publicity campaign to put the company and themselves in a better light. Though Flagler and Rockefeller had long maintained a policy of active silence with the press, they decided to make themselves more accessible and responded with conciliatory comments such as "capital and labor are both wild forces which require intelligent legislation to hold them in restriction."


title: Henry Flagler

text: Flagler and Rockefeller continued to consolidate their oil interests as best they could until New Jersey, in 1909, changed its incorporation laws to effectively allow a re-creation of the trust in the form of a single holding company. Rockefeller retained his nominal title as president until 1911 and he kept his stock. At last in 1911, the Supreme Court of the United States found Standard Oil Company of New Jersey in violation of the Sherman Antitrust Act. By then the trust still had a 70% market share of the refined oil market but only 14% of the U.S. crude oil supply. The court ruled that the trust originated in illegal monopoly practices and ordered it to be broken up into 34 new companies. These included, among many others, Continental Oil, which became Conoco, now part of ConocoPhillips; Standard of Indiana, which became Amoco, now part of BP; Standard of California, which became Chevron; Standard of New Jersey, which became Esso (and later, Exxon), now part of ExxonMobil; Standard of New York, which became Mobil, now part of ExxonMobil; and Standard of Ohio, which became Sohio, now part of BP. Pennzoil and Chevron have remained separate companies.


title: Henry Flagler

text: When Flagler envisioned successes in the oil industry, he and Rockefeller started building their fortune in refining oil in Cleveland, Ohio. Cleveland became very well known for oil refining, as, "More and more crude oil was shipped from the oil regions to Cleveland for the refining process because of transportation facilities and the aggressiveness of the refiners there. It was due largely to the efforts of Henry M. Flagler and John D. Rockefeller." Flagler and Rockefeller worked hard for their company to achieve such prominence. Henry explained: "We worked night and day, making good oil as cheaply as possible and selling it for all we could get." Not only did Flagler and Rockefeller's Standard Oil company become well known in Ohio, they expanded to other states, as well as gained additional capital in purchasing smaller oil refining companies across the nation. According to Allan Nevins, in "John D. Rockefeller" (p 292), "Standard Oil was born as a big enterprise, it had cut its teeth as a partnership and was now ready to plunge forward into a period of greater expansion and development. It soon was doing one tenth of all the petroleum business in the United States. Besides its two refineries and a barrel plant in Cleveland, it possessed a fleet of tank cars and warehouses in the oil regions as well as warehouses and tanks in New York."


title: Henry Flagler

text: By 1892, Standard Oil had a monopoly over all oil refineries in the United States. In an overall calculation of America's oil refineries' assets and capital, Standard Oil surpassed all. Standard Oil's combined assets equalled approximately $42,882,650 (equivalent to $ in ) in Indiana, Kentucky, New Jersey, New York and Ohio. Standard Oil also had the highest capitalization, totaling $26,000,000 (equivalent to $ in ). The history of American oil refining begins with Flagler and Rockefeller, as they built the biggest, most prosperous and monopolizing oil empire of their time: Standard Oil.


title: Henry Flagler

text: Although Standard Oil was a partnership, Flagler was credited as the brain behind the booming oil refining business. "When John D. Rockefeller was asked if the Standard Oil company was the result of his thinking, he answered, 'No, sir. I wish I had the brains to think of it. It was Henry M. Flagler.'" Flagler served as an active part of Standard Oil until 1882, when he stepped back to take a secondary role at Standard Oil. He served as a vice president through 1908 and was part of ownership until 1911.


title: Henry Flagler

text: When Flagler's first wife Mary (née Harkness) fell sick, his physician recommended they travel to Jacksonville for the winter to escape the brutal conditions of the North. For the first time, Flagler was able to experience the warm, sunny atmosphere of Florida. Two years after his first wife died in 1881, he married again. Ida Alice (née Shourds) Flagler had been a caregiver for Mary. After their wedding, the couple traveled to Saint Augustine. Flagler found the city charming, but the hotel facilities and transportation systems inadequate. Franklin W. Smith had just finished building Villa Zorayda and Flagler offered to buy it for his honeymoon. Smith would not sell, but he planted the seed of St. Augustine's and Florida's future in Flagler's mind.


title: Henry Flagler

text: Although Flagler remained on the board of directors of Standard Oil, he gave up his day-to-day involvement in the corporation to pursue his interests in Florida. He returned to St. Augustine in 1885 and made Smith an offer. If Smith could raise $50,000, Flagler would invest $150,000 and they would build a hotel together. Perhaps fortunately for Smith, he couldn't come up with the funds, so Flagler began construction of the 540-room Ponce de Leon Hotel by himself, but spent several times his original estimate. Smith helped train the masons on the mixing and pouring techniques he used on Zorayda.


title: Henry Flagler

text: Realizing the need for a sound transportation system to support his hotel ventures, Flagler purchased short line railroads in what would later become known as the Florida East Coast Railway. He used convict leasing — "a method undertaken by the Southern States to replace the economic setup of slavery" — to modernize the existing railroads, allowing them to accommodate heavier loads and more traffic.


title: Henry Flagler

text: His next project was the Ponce de Leon Hotel, now part of Flagler College. He invested with the guidance of Dr. Andrew Anderson, a native of St. Augustine. After many years of work, it opened on January 10, 1888, and was an instant success.


title: Henry Flagler

text: This project sparked Flagler's interest in creating a new "American Riviera." Two years later, he expanded his Florida holdings. He built a railroad bridge across the St. Johns River to gain access to the southern half of the state and purchased the Hotel Ormond, just north of Daytona. He also built the Alcazar Hotel as an overflow hotel for the Ponce de Leon Hotel. The Alcazar is today the Lightner Museum, next to the Casa Monica Hotel in St. Augustine that Flagler bought from Franklin W. Smith. His personal dedication to the state of Florida was demonstrated when he began construction on his private residence, Kirkside, in St. Augustine.


title: Henry Flagler

text: An immense engineering effort was required to cut through the wilderness and marsh from St. Augustine to Palm Beach. The state provided incentive in the form of for every mile () of track constructed.


title: Henry Flagler

text: Flagler completed the 1,100-room Royal Poinciana Hotel on the shores of Lake Worth in Palm Beach and extended his railroad to its service town, West Palm Beach, by 1894, founding Palm Beach and West Palm Beach. The Royal Poinciana Hotel was at the time the largest wooden structure in the world. Two years later, Flagler built the Palm Beach Inn (renamed The Breakers in 1901), overlooking the Atlantic Ocean in Palm Beach.


title: Henry Flagler

text: Flagler originally intended West Palm Beach to be the terminus of his railroad system, but in 1894 and 1895, severe freezes hit the area, causing Flagler to reconsider. south, the area today known as Miami was reportedly unharmed by the freeze. To further convince Flagler to continue the railroad to Miami, he was offered land in exchange for laying rail tracks from private landowners, the Florida East Coast Canal and Transportation Company, and the Boston and Florida Atlantic Coast Land Company. The land owners were Julia Tuttle, whom he had met in Cleveland, Ohio, and William Brickell, who ran a trading post on the Miami River.


title: Henry Flagler

text: Such incentive led to the development of Miami, which was an unincorporated area at the time. Flagler encouraged fruit farming and settlement along his railway line and made many gifts to build hospitals, churches and schools in Florida.


title: Henry Flagler

text: By 1896, Flagler's railroad, the Florida East Coast Railway, reached Biscayne Bay. Flagler dredged a channel, built streets, instituted the first water and power systems, and financed the city's first newspaper, "The Metropolis". When the city was incorporated in 1896, its citizens wanted to honor the man responsible for its growth by naming it "Flagler". He declined the honor, persuading them to use an old Indian name, "Mayaimi". Instead, an artificial island was constructed in Biscayne Bay called Flagler Monument Island. In 1897, Flagler opened the exclusive Royal Palm Hotel on the north bank of the Miami River where it overlooked Biscayne Bay. He became known as the Father of Miami, Florida.


title: Henry Flagler

text: Flagler's second wife, the former Ida Alice Shourds, was declared insane by Flagler's friend Dr. Anderson in 1896 and was institutionalized on and off starting that year. At the same time, he began to have an affair with Mary Lily Kenan; by 1899, newspapers began to openly question whether the two were having an affair. That year he reportedly gave her more than $1 million in jewelry. In 1901, Flagler bribed the Florida Legislature and Governor to pass a law that made incurable insanity grounds for divorce, opening the way for Flagler to remarry. Flagler was the only person to be divorced under the law before it was repealed in 1905. A spouse's mental incapacity was later restored by the legislature as a grounds for dissolution of marriage, and remains the law of Florida today.


title: Henry Flagler

text: On August 24, 1901, 10 days after his divorce, Flagler married Mary Lily at her family's plantation, Liberty Hall, and the couple soon moved into their new Palm Beach estate, Whitehall, a 55-room beaux arts home designed by the New York-based firm of Carrère and Hastings, which also had designed the New York Public Library and the Pan-American Exposition. Built in 1902 as a wedding present to Mary Lily, Whitehall (now the Flagler Museum) was a 60,000-square-foot (5,600 m²) winter retreat that established the Palm Beach "season" of about 8–12 weeks, for the wealthy of America's Gilded Age.


title: Henry Flagler

text: By 1905, Flagler decided that his Florida East Coast Railway should be extended from Biscayne Bay to Key West, a point past the end of the Florida peninsula. At the time, Key West was Florida's most populous city, with a population of 20,000, and it was also the United States' deep water port closest to the canal that the U.S. government proposed to build in Panama. Flagler wanted to take advantage of additional trade with Cuba and Latin America as well as the increased trade with the west that the Panama Canal would bring.


title: Henry Flagler

text: In 1912, the Florida Overseas Railroad was completed to Key West. Over 30 years, Flagler had invested about $50 million in railroad, home and hotel construction and had made donations to suffering farmers after the freeze in 1894. When asked by the president of Rollins College in Winter Park about his philanthropic efforts, Flagler reportedly replied, "I believe this state is the easiest place for many men to gain a living. I do not believe any one else would develop it if I do not..., but I do hope to live long enough to prove I am a good business man by getting a dividend on my investment."


title: Henry Flagler

text: Flagler allegedly used convicts leased from Florida prison camps, the majority of them African-American, to clear land for the Royal Palm Hotel in Miami and to build the Florida East Coast Railway from West Palm Beach to Miami and the rail extension to Key West. He also used labor agencies to bring around 4,000 new immigrants to Florida who contracted to work until their transportation costs had been paid off. Due to the harsh working and living conditions in the railway construction camps, many workers became victims of debt slavery.


title: Henry Flagler

text: When the Department of Justice prosecuted four Flagler employment agents in 1908 for "conspiracy to hold workmen in peonage and slavery," the Flagler-owned The Florida Times-Union and other Florida newspapers depending on the Times-Union for material or owned by Flagler published articles to "influence juries and public opinion." The judge instructed the jury to find them not guilty because the "prosecution had failed to prove 'an agreement of minds with evil intent to conspire'."


title: Henry Flagler

text: A congressional investigation in 1909 concluded that "there had been little immigrant peonage in the South and none in the ... [railway camps] camps in the Keys. Congress concluded that newspapers in Florida and across the South spread the deceitful news against Flagler."


title: Henry Flagler

text: According to historian Joe Knetsch, reformers and muckrakers exaggerated charges of peonage regarding construction of the Florida East Coast Railway in 1893 to 1909. Flager and his lawyers defeated all legal challenges and neither the company or its employees were ever convicted in court. However there were many reports harsh working conditions and forced indebtedness to the company, and malfeasance by labor agents who hired men for the railway. Knetsch concludes that "Flagler in fact provided health care for his employees and was a far better employer than the press alleged."


title: Henry Flagler

text: In March 1913, Flagler fell down a flight of marble stairs at Whitehall. He never recovered and died in Palm Beach of his injuries on May 20, 1913 at 83 years of age. At 3 p.m. on the day of the funeral, May 23, 1913, every engine on the Florida East Coast Railway stopped wherever it was for ten minutes as a tribute to Flagler. It was reported that people along the railway line waited all night for the passing of the funeral train as it traveled from Palm Beach to St. Augustine.


title: Henry Flagler

text: Flagler was entombed in the Flagler family mausoleum at Memorial Presbyterian Church in St. Augustine alongside his first wife, Mary Harkness; daughter, Jenny Louise; and granddaughter, Marjorie. Only his son Harry Harkness Flagler survived of the three children by his first marriage in 1853 to Mary Harkness. A large portion of his estate was designated for a "niece" who was said actually to be a child born out of wedlock.


title: Henry Flagler

text: When looking back at Flagler's life, after Flagler's death, George W. Perkins, of J.P. Morgan & Co., reflected, "But that any man could have the genius to see of what this wilderness of waterless sand and underbrush was capable and then have the nerve to build a railroad here, is more marvelous than similar development anywhere else in the world."


title: Henry Flagler

text: Miami's main east-west street is named Flagler Street and is the main shopping street in Downtown Miami. There is also a monument to him on Flagler Monument Island in Biscayne Bay in Miami; Flagler College and Flagler Hospital are named after him in St. Augustine. Flagler County, Florida, Flagler Beach, Florida and Flagler, Colorado are also named for him. Whitehall, Palm Beach, is open to the public as the Henry Morrison Flagler Museum; his private railcar No. 91 is preserved inside a Beaux Arts pavilion built to look like a 19th-century railway palace.


title: Henry Flagler

text: On February 24, 2006, a statue of Flagler was unveiled in Key West near the spot where the Over-Sea Railroad once terminated. Also, on July 28, 2006, a statue of Flagler was unveiled on the southeast steps of Miami's Dade County Courthouse, located on Miami's Flagler Street.


title: Henry Flagler

text: The Overseas Railroad, also known as the Key West Extension of the Florida East Coast Railway, was heavily damaged and partially destroyed in the Labor Day Hurricane of 1935. The railroad was financially unable to rebuild the destroyed sections, so the roadbed and remaining bridges were sold to the State of Florida, which built the Overseas Highway to Key West, using much of the remaining railway infrastructure.


title: Henry Flagler

text: Flagler's third wife, Mary Lily Kenan Flagler Bingham was born in North Carolina. The top-ranked Kenan-Flagler Business School at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill is named for Flagler and his wife, who was an early benefactor of UNC along with her family and descendants. After Flagler's death, she married an old friend, Robert Worth Bingham, who used an inheritance from her to buy the Louisville Courier-Journal newspaper. The Bingham-Flagler marriage (and questions about her death or possible murder) figured prominently in several books that appeared in the 1980s, when the Bingham family sold the newspaper in the midst of great acrimony. Control of the Flagler fortune largely passed into the hands of Mary Lily Kenan's family of sisters and brother, who survived into the 1960s.


title: Professional wrestling promotion

text: A professional wrestling promotion is a company or business that regularly performs shows involving professional wrestling that has little relationship to the rules of the amateur olympic form. "Promotion" also describes a role which entails management, advertising and logistics of running a wrestling event ("see promoter"). Within the convention of the show, the company is a sports governing body which sanctions wrestling matches and gives authority to the championships and is responsible for maintaining the divisions and their rankings. In truth, the company serves as a touring theatre troupe, as well as event promotion body for its own events.


title: Professional wrestling promotion

text: The most prominent promotions in the United States are World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE), All Elite Wrestling (AEW), Impact Wrestling, Ring of Honor (ROH), Major League Wrestling (MLW), and the National Wrestling Alliance (NWA). The largest Mexican lucha libre promotions are Consejo Mundial de Lucha Libre (CMLL) and Lucha Libre AAA Worldwide (AAA). Finally, the top puroresu promotions in Japan are New Japan Pro-Wrestling (NJPW), All Japan Pro Wrestling (AJPW), CyberFight, Dragon Gate, and World Wonder Ring Stardom (Stardom).


title: Professional wrestling promotion

text: Additionally, there are smaller Independent promotions or territories around the world. Whereas major promotions have a roster of talent under contracts to them, these smaller promotions may use a combination of contracted workers and free agents.


title: Professional wrestling promotion

text: Most promotions are self-contained, organized around one or more championships and do not acknowledge or recognize the legitimacy of other promotions' titles unless they share a working agreement. Governing bodies, such as the CyberFight, United Wrestling Network, WWNLive, Allied Independent Wrestling Federations, Pro Wrestling International and, previously, the National Wrestling Alliance, act as an umbrella organization which governs titles that are shared among multiple promotions. During the 1950s, the National Wrestling Alliance oversaw many wrestling territories such as Mid-Atlantic Wrestling and NWA San Francisco, in a business model known as the "territory system".


title: Yuto Nagatomo

text: A graduate from the Meiji University, Nagatomo started his professional career with FC Tokyo in 2007, quickly establishing himself as a first choice both within the team and the Japanese national team. He would go on to play in Europe for over a decade, first joining Cesena in 2010, and then enjoying stints with Inter Milan (where he played for seven years, making more than 200 total appearances and even captaining the team for a brief period of time), Galatasaray and Olympique Marseille. He would then go back to his boyhood club FC Tokyo in September 2021.


title: Yuto Nagatomo

text: During his club career, he won a J.League Cup in 2009 (with Tokyo), a Coppa Italia in 2011 (with Inter Milan), two back-to-back Turkish titles in 2018 and 2019, both a Turkish Cup and a Turkish Super Cup in 2019 (all with Galatasaray). He also won an individual award as AFC's Asian International Player of the Year in 2013.


title: Yuto Nagatomo

text: With 142 caps (as well as four goals), Nagatomo is Japan's second-most capped player of all time, behind only Yasuhito Endō. Having won his first cap for the "Samurai Blue" in 2008, just some months after making his professional debut with FC Tokyo, the full-back has represented Japan at one edition of the Olympic Games (in 2008), four consecutive World Cups (in 2010, 2014, 2018 and 2022), three consecutive Asian Cups (in 2011, 2015 and 2019) and one Confederations Cup (in 2013). He was part both of the squad that won the Asian Cup in 2011 and the one that finished as runners-up in the same competition in 2019.


title: Yuto Nagatomo

text: Nagatomo officially signed with FC Tokyo in 2008, while at Meiji. But he made an appearance at J.League Cup as Special Designated Youth Player in 2007. Nagatomo made 84 appearances in his four years at FC Tokyo.


title: Yuto Nagatomo

text: In July 2010, Nagatomo was signed on loan by the newly promoted Serie A side Cesena, where he played the first half of the season as Cesena's starting left back. Before moving to Italy, Nagatomo gave a speech to 25,000 supporters just after the match involving F.C. Tokyo and Vissel Kobe on 17 July 2010. After being signed on a permanent deal, Nagatomo was then sold to Internazionale.


title: Yuto Nagatomo

text: Due to his impressive performances for both Cesena and Japan in the 2011 Asian Cup, he was fully signed by Cesena in January 2011. But before making any league appearances he was sent straight out on loan to Internazionale in exchange for Davide Santon also on loan, becoming the first East Asian player to sign with Internazionale.


title: Yuto Nagatomo

text: Nagatomo, wearing number 55, made his debut for "Nerazzurri" on 6 February 2011, replacing Wesley Sneijder in the Serie A match against Roma, won by Inter 5–3. In the following game, Nagatomo came on as a late substitute against Juventus, before starting in both of the following games against Fiorentina and Cagliari. Nagatomo showed his versatility by playing right back against Sampdoria on 27 February, and finishing the whole 90 minutes. On 6 March 2011, Nagatomo scored his first goal for Inter in the 5–2 trashing of Genoa on a Kharja assist with a swivel and a finish into the roof of the net.


title: Yuto Nagatomo

text: On 15 March, to show solidarity with his home country in light of the catastrophic earthquake and tsunami which took place the previous week he paraded the Japanese flag (with the writing "You'll Never Walk Alone", a chant of his former team in Tokyo) around the pitch during a Champions League match against Bayern Munich.


title: Yuto Nagatomo

text: Inter had drawn German club side Schalke 04 in the quarter-finals of Champions League. Nagatomo, along with international teammate Atsuto Uchida, who played for Schalke, became the second and third Japanese footballer to play in the quarter-finals of the UEFA Champions league. (Keisuke Honda was the first, playing for CSKA Moscow during 2009–10 season).


title: Yuto Nagatomo

text: After the Serie A season was over, Internazionale made an agreement with Cesena of making Yuto's move permanent in a cash plus player exchange deal. Nagatomo was valued at €10.95 million, however part of the fee was paid via half of the registration rights of Luca Garritano (€700,000) and Luca Caldirola (€2.5 million).


title: Yuto Nagatomo

text: Nagatomo started his second Inter Milan season by playing 62 minutes in the opening Serie A match against Palermo, ended in a 4–3 away defeat. On 27 September 2011, Nagatomo provided an assist for Giampaolo Pazzini by nutmegging Aleksei Berezutski before driving the ball across goal during the 3–2 away win against CSKA Moscow in the second group stage match of Champions League. He scored his first goal of the season on 10 December 2011 during the 2–0 home win against Fiorentina in the matchday 15 of Serie A. He was again in the scoresheet three days later as he headed home a Ricky Álvarez cross in the 1–0 win against Genoa. In the last match of 2011 against Lecce at home, Nagatomo produced a "man of the match" performance by providing two assists in an eventual 4–1 win.


title: Yuto Nagatomo

text: Nagatomo enjoyed his most productive season under Walter Mazzarri, scoring five goals, along with six assists during the 2013–14 season.


title: Yuto Nagatomo

text: Nagatomo lost his place in the starting lineup in the 2014–15 season, making only 14 league appearances. He captained Inter for the first time on 28 September 2014 in the 2014–15 Serie A matchday 5 versus Cagliari, leaving the field in the 27th minutes after receiving two yellow cards in 120 seconds as Inter was defeated 1–4 at San Siro. Nagatomo said that he had turned down a January 2016 offer from Premier League outfit Manchester United, stating that his intentions were to renew with Inter.


title: Yuto Nagatomo

text: On 8 April 2016, Nagatomo agreed a contract extension with the club, signing until June 2019. During the 2016–17 season, he played 20 matches in all competitions, including 16 in league, 11 of them as starter, as Inter finished 7th in championship, was eliminated in the quarter-final of Coppa Italia by Lazio, and finished bottom in Europa League Group K.


title: Yuto Nagatomo

text: Nagatomo improved his game at the start of 2017–18 season under new manager Luciano Spalletti, winning his place once again. His 200th official appearance for Inter occurred on 16 September 2017 in the matchday 3 match at Crotone, winning a free kick that lead to the first goal in an eventual 0–2 win. Later on 12 December, Nagatomo played 120 minutes in the 2017–18 Coppa Italia round of 16 fixture against underdogs of Pordenone. The match went to penalty shootouts where he netted the winning penalty in the 5–4 penalty shootout that led Internazionale to the victory and progression to quarter-finals.


title: Yuto Nagatomo

text: On 31 January 2018, Nagatomo joined Turkish club Galatasaray on loan for the remainder of the 2017–18 season. On 30 June 2018 the deal was made permanent.


title: Yuto Nagatomo

text: On 31 August 2020, Nagatomo signed with Ligue 1 club Marseille on a free transfer. He made his first appearance for the club in a 1–1 league draw against Lille on 20 September 2020.


title: Yuto Nagatomo

text: Nagatomo earned his first international cap for Japan on 24 May 2008 in a friendly against Ivory Coast. His first international goal was scored in a friendly against Syria held on 13 November 2008. Nagatomo was also a member of the Japan U-21 team for the 2008 Summer Olympics.


title: Yuto Nagatomo

text: Nagatomo was selected as part of the Japan squad for the 2011 AFC Asian Cup by coach Alberto Zaccheroni. He featured in every game Japan played in the competition and helped them defeat Australia in the final, thus earning his first international honour.


title: Yuto Nagatomo

text: He was included in Alberto Zaccheroni's 23-man Japan squad for the 2013 FIFA Confederations Cup where he featured in the three games before they were eliminated in the group stage.


title: Yuto Nagatomo

text: Nagatomo was part of Japan's national squad to play in the 2014 World Cup in Brazil. He started in all three group matches but Japan was eliminated in the group stage.


title: Yuto Nagatomo

text: Nagatomo earned his 100th international cap on 10 November 2017 by captaining his side in the 1–3 friendly loss to Brazil at Stade Pierre-Mauroy, Lille. This made his only the 7th Japan player to achieve the feat.


title: Yuto Nagatomo

text: Nagatomo is married to Japanese actress Airi Taira. The couple had maintained a long-distance relationship for several years as Taira was based in Japan. Nagatomo proposed to her on the San Siro pitch in February 2016 and they registered their marriage in January 2017. They have 3 sons. Both of them appeared in the Captain Tsubasa Olympics special which, aired as part of the annual Jikan Terebi Nihon no Sport wa Tsuyo in November 2019.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: The Kepler space telescope is a disused space telescope launched by NASA in 2009 to discover Earth-sized planets orbiting other stars. Named after astronomer Johannes Kepler, the spacecraft was launched into an Earth-trailing heliocentric orbit. The principal investigator was William J. Borucki. After nine and a half years of operation, the telescope's reaction control system fuel was depleted, and NASA announced its retirement on October 30, 2018.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: Designed to survey a portion of Earth's region of the Milky Way to discover Earth-size exoplanets in or near habitable zones and estimate how many of the billions of stars in the Milky Way have such planets, Kepler's sole scientific instrument is a photometer that continually monitored the brightness of approximately 150,000 main sequence stars in a fixed field of view. These data were transmitted to Earth, then analyzed to detect periodic dimming caused by exoplanets that cross in front of their host star. Only planets whose orbits are seen edge-on from Earth could be detected. Kepler observed 530,506 stars and detected 2,662 planets.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: The Kepler space telescope was part of NASA's Discovery Program of relatively low-cost science missions. The telescope's construction and initial operation were managed by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, with Ball Aerospace responsible for developing the Kepler flight system.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: In January 2006, the project's launch was delayed eight months because of budget cuts and consolidation at NASA. It was delayed again by four months in March 2006 due to fiscal problems. At this time, the high-gain antenna was changed from a gimbal-led design to one fixed to the frame of the spacecraft to reduce cost and complexity, at the cost of one observation day per month.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: The Ames Research Center was responsible for the ground system development, mission operations since December 2009, and scientific data analysis. The initial planned lifetime was 3.5 years, but greater-than-expected noise in the data, from both the stars and the spacecraft, meant additional time was needed to fulfill all mission goals. Initially, in 2012, the mission was expected to be extended until 2016, but on July 14, 2012, one of the spacecraft's four reaction wheels used for pointing the spacecraft stopped turning, and completing the mission would only be possible if all other reaction wheels remained reliable. Then, on May 11, 2013, a second reaction wheel failed, disabling the collection of science data and threatening the continuation of the mission.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: On August 33, 2015, NASA announced that they had given up trying to fix the two failed reaction wheels. This meant the current mission needed to be modified, but it did not necessarily mean the end of planet hunting. NASA had asked the space science community to propose alternative mission plans "potentially including an exoplanet search, using the remaining two good reaction wheels and thrusters". On November 18, 2013, the K2 "Second Light" proposal was reported. This would include utilizing the disabled Kepler in a way that could detect habitable planets around smaller, dimmer red dwarfs. On May 16, 2014, NASA announced the approval of the K2 extension.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: By January 2015, Kepler and its follow-up observations had found 1,013 confirmed exoplanets in about 440 star systems, along with a further 3,199 unconfirmed planet candidates. Four planets have been confirmed through Kepler's K2 mission. In November 2013, astronomers estimated, based on Kepler space mission data, that there could be as many as 40 billion rocky Earth-size exoplanets orbiting in the habitable zones of Sun-like stars and red dwarfs within the Milky Way. It is estimated that 11 billion of these planets may be orbiting Sun-like stars. The nearest such planet may be away, according to the scientists.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: On January 6, 2015, NASA announced the 1,000th confirmed exoplanet discovered by the Kepler space telescope. Four of the newly confirmed exoplanets were found to orbit within habitable zones of their related stars: three of the four, Kepler-438b, Kepler-442b and Kepler-452b, are almost Earth-size and likely rocky; the fourth, Kepler-440b, is a super-Earth. On May 10, 2016, NASA verified 1,284 new exoplanets found by Kepler, the single largest finding of planets to date.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: Kepler data has also helped scientists observe and understand supernovae; measurements were collected every half-hour so the light curves were especially useful for studying these types of astronomical events.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: On October 30, 2018, after the spacecraft ran out of fuel, NASA announced that the telescope would be retired. The telescope was shut down the same day, bringing an end to its nine-year service. Kepler observed 530,506 stars and discovered 2,662 exoplanets over its lifetime. A newer NASA mission, TESS, launched in 2018, is continuing the search for exoplanets.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: The telescope has a mass of and contains a Schmidt camera with a front corrector plate (lens) feeding a primary mirror—at the time of its launch this was the largest mirror on any telescope outside Earth orbit, though the Herschel Space Observatory took this title a few months later. Its telescope has a 115 deg (about 12-degree diameter) field of view (FoV), roughly equivalent to the size of one's fist held at arm's length. Of this, 105 deg is of science quality, with less than 11% vignetting. The photometer has a soft focus to provide excellent photometry, rather than sharp images. The mission goal was a combined differential photometric precision (CDPP) of 20 ppm for a "m"(V)=12 Sun-like star for a 6.5-hour integration, though the observations fell short of this objective (see mission status).


title: Kepler space telescope

text: The focal plane of the spacecraft's camera is made out of forty-two CCDs at 2200×1024 pixels each, possessing a total resolution of 94.6 megapixels, which at the time made it the largest camera system launched into space. The array was cooled by heat pipes connected to an external radiator. The CCDs were read out every 6.5 seconds (to limit saturation) and co-added on board for 58.89 seconds for short cadence targets, and 1765.5 seconds (29.4 minutes) for long cadence targets.<ref name="Kepler/K2 Data Products"></ref> Due to the larger bandwidth requirements for the former, these were limited in number to 512 compared to 170,000 for long cadence. However, even though at launch Kepler had the highest data rate of any NASA mission, the 29-minute sums of all 95 million pixels constituted more data than could be stored and sent back to Earth. Therefore, the science team pre-selected the relevant pixels associated with each star of interest, amounting to about 6 percent of the pixels (5.4 megapixels). The data from these pixels was then requantized, compressed and stored, along with other auxiliary data, in the on-board 16 gigabyte solid-state recorder. Data that was stored and downlinked includes science stars, p-mode stars, smear, black level, background and full field-of-view images.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: The Kepler primary mirror is in diameter. Manufactured by glass maker Corning using ultra-low expansion (ULE) glass, the mirror is specifically designed to have a mass only 14% that of a solid mirror of the same size. To produce a space telescope system with sufficient sensitivity to detect relatively small planets, as they pass in front of stars, a very high reflectance coating on the primary mirror was required. Using ion assisted evaporation, Surface Optics Corp. applied a protective nine-layer silver coating to enhance reflection and a dielectric interference coating to minimize the formation of color centers and atmospheric moisture absorption.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: In terms of photometric performance, Kepler worked well, much better than any Earth-bound telescope, but short of design goals. The objective was a combined differential photometric precision (CDPP) of 20 parts per million (PPM) on a magnitude 12 star for a 6.5-hour integration. This estimate was developed allowing 10 ppm for stellar variability, roughly the value for the Sun. The obtained accuracy for this observation has a wide range, depending on the star and position on the focal plane, with a median of 29 ppm. Most of the additional noise appears to be due to a larger-than-expected variability in the stars themselves (19.5 ppm as opposed to the assumed 10.0 ppm), with the rest due to instrumental noise sources slightly larger than predicted.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: Because decrease in brightness from an Earth-size planet transiting a Sun-like star is so small, only 80 ppm, the increased noise means each individual transit is only a 2.7 σ event, instead of the intended 4 σ. This, in turn, means more transits must be observed to be sure of a detection. Scientific estimates indicated that a mission lasting 7 to 8 years, as opposed to the originally planned 3.5 years, would be needed to find all transiting Earth-sized planets. On April 4, 2012, the "Kepler" mission was approved for extension through the fiscal year 2016, but this also depended on all remaining reaction wheels staying healthy, which turned out not to be the case (see Reaction wheel issues below).


title: Kepler space telescope

text: Kepler orbits the Sun, which avoids Earth occultations, stray light, and gravitational perturbations and torques inherent in an Earth orbit.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: NASA has characterized Kepler's orbit as "Earth-trailing". With an orbital period of 372.5 days, Kepler is slowly falling farther behind Earth (about 16 million miles per annum). , the distance to Kepler from Earth was about .


title: Kepler space telescope

text: This means that after about 26 years Kepler will reach the other side of the Sun and will get back to the neighborhood of the Earth after 51 years.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: Until 2013 the photometer pointed to a field in the northern constellations of Cygnus, Lyra and Draco, which is well out of the ecliptic plane, so that sunlight never enters the photometer as the spacecraft orbits. This is also the direction of the Solar System's motion around the center of the galaxy. Thus, the stars which Kepler observed are roughly the same distance from the galactic center as the Solar System, and also close to the galactic plane. This fact is important if position in the galaxy is related to habitability, as suggested by the Rare Earth hypothesis.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: Orientation is 3-axis stabilised by sensing rotations using fine-guidance sensors located on the instrument focal plane (instead of rate sensing gyroscopes, e.g. as used on Hubble). and using reaction wheels and hydrazine thrusters to control the orientation.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: Kepler was operated out of Boulder, Colorado, by the Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics (LASP) under contract to Ball Aerospace & Technologies. The spacecraft's solar array was rotated to face the Sun at the solstices and equinoxes, so as to optimize the amount of sunlight falling on the solar array and to keep the heat radiator pointing towards deep space. Together, LASP and Ball Aerospace control the spacecraft from a mission operations center located on the research campus of the University of Colorado. LASP performs essential mission planning and the initial collection and distribution of the science data. The mission's initial life-cycle cost was estimated at US$600 million, including funding for 3.5 years of operation. In 2012, NASA announced that the Kepler mission would be funded until 2016 at a cost of about $20 million per year.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: NASA contacted the spacecraft using the X band communication link twice a week for command and status updates. Scientific data are downloaded once a month using the K band link at a maximum data transfer rate of approximately 550 kB/s. The high gain antenna is not steerable so data collection is interrupted for a day to reorient the whole spacecraft and the high gain antenna for communications to Earth.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: The Kepler space telescope conducted its own partial analysis on board and only transmitted scientific data deemed necessary to the mission in order to conserve bandwidth.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: Science data telemetry collected during mission operations at LASP is sent for processing to the Kepler Data Management Center (DMC) which is located at the Space Telescope Science Institute on the campus of Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland. The science data telemetry is decoded and processed into uncalibrated FITS-format science data products by the DMC, which are then passed along to the Science Operations Center (SOC) at NASA Ames Research Center, for calibration and final processing. The SOC at NASA Ames Research Center (ARC) develops and operates the tools needed to process scientific data for use by the "Kepler" Science Office (SO). Accordingly, the SOC develops the pipeline data processing software based on scientific algorithms developed jointly by the SO and SOC. During operations, the SOC:


title: Kepler space telescope

text: The SOC also evaluates the photometric performance on an ongoing basis and provides the performance metrics to the SO and Mission Management Office. Finally, the SOC develops and maintains the project's scientific databases, including catalogs and processed data. The SOC finally returns calibrated data products and scientific results back to the DMC for long-term archiving, and distribution to astronomers around the world through the Multimission Archive at STScI (MAST).


title: Kepler space telescope

text: On July 14, 2012, one of the four reaction wheels used for fine pointing of the spacecraft failed. While Kepler requires only three reaction wheels to accurately aim the telescope, another failure would leave the spacecraft unable to aim at its original field.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: After showing some problems in January 2013, a second reaction wheel failed on May 11, 2013, ending Kepler's primary mission. The spacecraft was put into safe mode, then from June to August 2013 a series of engineering tests were done to try to recover either failed wheel. By August 15, 2013, it was decided that the wheels were unrecoverable, and an engineering report was ordered to assess the spacecraft's remaining capabilities.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: This effort ultimately led to the "K2" follow-on mission observing different fields near the ecliptic.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: In January 2006, the project's launch was delayed eight months because of budget cuts and consolidation at NASA. It was delayed again by four months in March 2006 due to fiscal problems. At this time, the high-gain antenna was changed from a gimballed design to one fixed to the frame of the spacecraft to reduce cost and complexity, at the cost of one observation day per month.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: The Kepler observatory was launched on March 7, 2009, at 03:49:57 UTC aboard a Delta II rocket from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida. The launch was a success and all three stages were completed by 04:55 UTC. The cover of the telescope was jettisoned on April 7, 2009, and the first light images were taken on the next day.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: On April 20, 2009, it was announced that the Kepler science team had concluded that further refinement of the focus would dramatically increase the scientific return. On April 23, 2009, it was announced that the focus had been successfully optimized by moving the primary mirror 40 micrometers (1.6 thousandths of an inch) towards the focal plane and tilting the primary mirror 0.0072 degree.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: On May 13, 2009, at 00:01 UTC, Kepler successfully completed its commissioning phase and began its search for planets around other stars.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: On June 19, 2009, the spacecraft successfully sent its first science data to Earth. It was discovered that Kepler had entered safe mode on June 15. A second safe mode event occurred on July 2. In both cases the event was triggered by a "processor reset". The spacecraft resumed normal operation on July 3 and the science data that had been collected since June 19 was downlinked that day. On October 14, 2009, the cause of these safing events was determined to be a low voltage power supply that provides power to the RAD750 processor. On January 12, 2010, one portion of the focal plane transmitted anomalous data, suggesting a problem with focal plane MOD-3 module, covering two out of Kepler's 42 CCDs. , the module was described as "failed", but the coverage still exceeded the science goals.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: Kepler downlinked roughly twelve gigabytes of data about once per month—an example of such a downlink was on November 22–23, 2010.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: Kepler has a fixed field of view (FOV) against the sky. The diagram to the right shows the celestial coordinates and where the detector fields are located, along with the locations of a few bright stars with celestial north at the top left corner. The mission website has a calculator that will determine if a given object falls in the FOV, and if so, where it will appear in the photo detector output data stream. Data on exoplanet candidates is submitted to the Kepler Follow-up Program, or KFOP, to conduct follow-up observations.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: Kepler's field of view covers 115 square degrees, around 0.25 percent of the sky, or "about two scoops of the Big Dipper". Thus, it would require around 400 Kepler-like telescopes to cover the whole sky. The Kepler field contains portions of the constellations Cygnus, Lyra, and Draco.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: The nearest star system in Kepler's field of view is the trinary star system Gliese 1245, 15 light years from the Sun. The brown dwarf WISE J2000+3629, 22.8 ± 1 light years from the Sun is also in the field of view, but is invisible to Kepler due to emitting light primarily in infrared wavelengths.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: The scientific objective of the Kepler space telescope was to explore the structure and diversity of planetary systems. This spacecraft observes a large sample of stars to achieve several key goals:


title: Kepler space telescope

text: Most of the exoplanets previously detected by other projects were giant planets, mostly the size of Jupiter and bigger. Kepler was designed to look for planets 30 to 600 times less massive, closer to the order of Earth's mass (Jupiter is 318 times more massive than Earth). The method used, the transit method, involves observing repeated transit of planets in front of their stars, which causes a slight reduction in the star's apparent magnitude, on the order of 0.01% for an Earth-size planet. The degree of this reduction in brightness can be used to deduce the diameter of the planet, and the interval between transits can be used to deduce the planet's orbital period, from which estimates of its orbital semi-major axis (using Kepler's laws) and its temperature (using models of stellar radiation) can be calculated.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: The probability of a random planetary orbit being along the line-of-sight to a star is the diameter of the star divided by the diameter of the orbit. For an Earth-size planet at 1 AU transiting a Sun-like star the probability is 0.47%, or about 1 in 210. For a planet like Venus orbiting a Sun-like star the probability is slightly higher, at 0.65%; If the host star has multiple planets, the probability of additional detections is higher than the probability of initial detection assuming planets in a given system tend to orbit in similar planes—an assumption consistent with current models of planetary system formation. For instance, if a "Kepler"-like mission conducted by aliens observed Earth transiting the Sun, there is a 7% chance that it would also see Venus transiting.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: Kepler's 115 deg field of view gives it a much higher probability of detecting Earth-sized planets than the Hubble Space Telescope, which has a field of view of only 10 sq. arc-minutes. Moreover, Kepler is dedicated to detecting planetary transits, while the Hubble Space Telescope is used to address a wide range of scientific questions, and rarely looks continuously at just one starfield. Of the approximately half-million stars in Kepler's field of view, around 150,000 stars were selected for observation. More than 90,000 are G-type stars on, or near, the main sequence. Thus, Kepler was designed to be sensitive to wavelengths of 400–865 nm where brightness of those stars peaks. Most of the stars observed by Kepler have apparent visual magnitude between 14 and 16 but the brightest observed stars have apparent visual magnitude of 8 or lower. Most of the planet candidates were initially not expected to be confirmed due to being too faint for follow-up observations. All the selected stars are observed simultaneously, with the spacecraft measuring variations in their brightness every thirty minutes. This provides a better chance for seeing a transit. The mission was designed to maximize the probability of detecting planets orbiting other stars.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: Because Kepler must observe at least three transits to confirm that the dimming of a star was caused by a transiting planet, and because larger planets give a signal that is easier to check, scientists expected the first reported results to be larger Jupiter-size planets in tight orbits. The first of these were reported after only a few months of operation. Smaller planets, and planets farther from their sun would take longer, and discovering planets comparable to Earth were expected to take three years or longer.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: Data collected by Kepler is also being used for studying variable stars of various types and performing asteroseismology, particularly on stars showing solar-like oscillations.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: Once Kepler has collected and sent back the data, raw light curves are constructed. Brightness values are then adjusted to take the brightness variations due to the rotation of the spacecraft into account. The next step is processing (folding) light curves into a more easily observable form and letting software select signals that seem potentially transit-like. At this point, any signal that shows potential transit-like features is called a threshold crossing event. These signals are individually inspected in two inspection rounds, with the first round taking only a few seconds per target. This inspection eliminates erroneously selected non-signals, signals caused by instrumental noise and obvious eclipsing binaries.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: Threshold crossing events that pass these tests are called Kepler Objects of Interest (KOI), receive a KOI designation and are archived. KOIs are inspected more thoroughly in a process called dispositioning. Those which pass the dispositioning are called Kepler planet candidates. The KOI archive is not static, meaning that a Kepler candidate could end up in the false-positive list upon further inspection. In turn, KOIs that were mistakenly classified as false positives could end up back in the candidates list.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: Not all the planet candidates go through this process. Circumbinary planets do not show strictly periodic transits, and have to be inspected through other methods. In addition, third-party researchers use different data-processing methods, or even search planet candidates from the unprocessed light curve data. As a consequence, those planets may be missing KOI designation.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: Once suitable candidates have been found from Kepler data, it is necessary to rule out false positives with follow-up tests.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: Usually, Kepler candidates are imaged individually with more-advanced ground-based telescopes in order to resolve any background objects which could contaminate the brightness signature of the transit signal. Another method to rule out planet candidates is astrometry for which Kepler can collect good data even though doing so was not a design goal. While Kepler cannot detect planetary-mass objects with this method, it can be used to determine if the transit was caused by a stellar-mass object.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: There are a few different exoplanet detection methods which help to rule out false positives by giving further proof that a candidate is a real planet. One of the methods, called doppler spectroscopy, requires follow-up observations from ground-based telescopes. This method works well if the planet is massive or is located around a relatively bright star. While current spectrographs are insufficient for confirming planetary candidates with small masses around relatively dim stars, this method can be used to discover additional massive non-transiting planet candidates around targeted stars.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: In multiplanetary systems, planets can often be confirmed through transit timing variation by looking at the time between successive transits, which may vary if planets are gravitationally perturbed by each other. This helps to confirm relatively low-mass planets even when the star is relatively distant. Transit timing variations indicate that two or more planets belong to the same planetary system. There are even cases where a non-transiting planet is also discovered in this way.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: Circumbinary planets show much larger transit timing variations between transits than planets gravitationally disturbed by other planets. Their transit duration times also vary significantly. Transit timing and duration variations for circumbinary planets are caused by the orbital motion of the host stars, rather than by other planets. In addition, if the planet is massive enough, it can cause slight variations of the host stars' orbital periods. Despite being harder to find circumbinary planets due to their non-periodic transits, it is much easier to confirm them, as timing patterns of transits cannot be mimicked by an eclipsing binary or a background star system.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: In addition to transits, planets orbiting around their stars undergo reflected-light variations—like the Moon, they go through phases from full to new and back again. Because Kepler cannot resolve the planet from the star, it sees only the combined light, and the brightness of the host star seems to change over each orbit in a periodic manner. Although the effect is small—the photometric precision required to see a close-in giant planet is about the same as to detect an Earth-sized planet in transit across a solar-type star—Jupiter-sized planets with an orbital period of a few days or less are detectable by sensitive space telescopes such as Kepler. In the long run, this method may help find more planets than the transit method, because the reflected light variation with orbital phase is largely independent of the planet's orbital inclination, and does not require the planet to pass in front of the disk of the star. In addition, the phase function of a giant planet is also a function of its thermal properties and atmosphere, if any. Therefore, the phase curve may constrain other planetary properties, such as the particle size distribution of the atmospheric particles.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: Kepler's photometric precision is often high enough to observe a star's brightness changes caused by doppler beaming or a star's shape deformation by a companion. These can sometimes be used to rule out hot Jupiter candidates as false positives caused by a star or a brown dwarf when these effects are too noticeable. However, there are some cases where such effects are detected even by planetary-mass companions such as TrES-2b.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: If a planet cannot be detected through at least one of the other detection methods, it can be confirmed by determining if the possibility of a Kepler candidate being a real planet is significantly larger than any false-positive scenarios combined. One of the first methods was to see if other telescopes can see the transit as well. The first planet confirmed through this method was Kepler-22b which was also observed with a Spitzer space telescope in addition to analyzing any other false-positive possibilities. Such confirmation is costly, as small planets can generally be detected only with space telescopes.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: In 2014, a new confirmation method called "validation by multiplicity" was announced. From the planets previously confirmed through various methods, it was found that planets in most planetary systems orbit in a relatively flat plane, similar to the planets found in the Solar System. This means that if a star has multiple planet candidates, it is very likely a real planetary system. Transit signals still need to meet several criteria which rule out false-positive scenarios. For instance, it has to have considerable signal-to-noise ratio, it has at least three observed transits, orbital stability of those systems have to be stable and transit curve has to have a shape that partly eclipsing binaries could not mimic the transit signal. In addition, its orbital period needs to be 1.6 days or longer to rule out common false positives caused by eclipsing binaries. Validation by multiplicity method is very efficient and allows to confirm hundreds of Kepler candidates in a relatively short amount of time.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: A new validation method using a tool called PASTIS has been developed. It makes it possible to confirm a planet even when only a single candidate transit event for the host star has been detected. A drawback of this tool is that it requires a relatively high signal-to-noise ratio from "Kepler" data, so it can mainly confirm only larger planets or planets around quiet and relatively bright stars. Currently, the analysis of Kepler candidates through this method is underway. PASTIS was first successful for validating the planet Kepler-420b.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: The Kepler space telescope was in active operation from 2009 through 2013, with the first main results announced on January 4, 2010. As expected, the initial discoveries were all short-period planets. As the mission continued, additional longer-period candidates were found. , Kepler has discovered 5,011 exoplanet candidates and 2,662 confirmed exoplanets.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: NASA held a press conference to discuss early science results of the Kepler mission on August 6, 2009. At this press conference, it was revealed that Kepler had confirmed the existence of the previously known transiting exoplanet HAT-P-7b, and was functioning well enough to discover Earth-size planets.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: Because Kepler's detection of planets depends on seeing very small changes in brightness, stars that vary in brightness by themselves (variable stars) are not useful in this search. From the first few months of data, Kepler scientists determined that about 7,500 stars from the initial target list are such variable stars. These were dropped from the target list, and replaced by new candidates. On November 4, 2009, the Kepler project publicly released the light curves of the dropped stars. The first new planet candidate observed by Kepler was originally marked as a false positive because of uncertainties in the mass of its parent star. However, it was confirmed ten years later and is now designated Kepler-1658b.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: The first six weeks of data revealed five previously unknown planets, all very close to their stars. Among the notable results are one of the least dense planets yet found, two low-mass white dwarfs that were initially reported as being members of a new class of stellar objects, and Kepler-16b, a well-characterized planet orbiting a binary star.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: On June 15, 2010, the Kepler mission released data on all but 400 of the ~156,000 planetary target stars to the public. 706 targets from this first data set have viable exoplanet candidates, with sizes ranging from as small as Earth to larger than Jupiter. The identity and characteristics of 306 of the 706 targets were given. The released targets included five candidate multi-planet systems, including six extra exoplanet candidates. Only 33.5 days of data were available for most of the candidates. NASA also announced data for another 400 candidates were being withheld to allow members of the "Kepler" team to perform follow-up observations. The data for these candidates was published February 2, 2011. (See the "Kepler" results for 2011 below.)


title: Kepler space telescope

text: The Kepler results, based on the candidates in the list released in 2010, implied that most candidate planets have radii less than half that of Jupiter. The results also imply that small candidate planets with periods less than thirty days are much more common than large candidate planets with periods less than thirty days and that the ground-based discoveries are sampling the large-size tail of the size distribution. This contradicted older theories which had suggested small and Earth-size planets would be relatively infrequent. Based on extrapolations from the "Kepler" data, an estimate of around 100 million habitable planets in the Milky Way may be realistic. Some media reports of the TED talk have led to the misunderstanding that "Kepler" had actually found these planets. This was clarified in a letter to the Director of the NASA Ames Research Center, for the Kepler Science Council dated August 2, 2010 states, "Analysis of the current Kepler data does not support the assertion that Kepler has found any Earth-like planets."


title: Kepler space telescope

text: In 2010, Kepler identified two systems containing objects which are smaller and hotter than their parent stars: KOI 74 and KOI 81. These objects are probably low-mass white dwarfs produced by previous episodes of mass transfer in their systems.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: On February 2, 2011, the Kepler team announced the results of analysis of the data taken between 2 May and September 16, 2009. They found 1235 planetary candidates circling 997 host stars. (The numbers that follow assume the candidates are really planets, though the official papers called them only candidates. Independent analysis indicated that at least 90% of them are real planets and not false positives). 68 planets were approximately Earth-size, 288 super-Earth-size, 662 Neptune-size, 165 Jupiter-size, and 19 up to twice the size of Jupiter. In contrast to previous work, roughly 74% of the planets are smaller than Neptune, most likely as a result of previous work finding large planets more easily than smaller ones.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: That February 2, 2011 release of 1235 exoplanet candidates included 54 that may be in the "habitable zone", including five less than twice the size of Earth. There were previously only two planets thought to be in the "habitable zone", so these new findings represent an enormous expansion of the potential number of "Goldilocks planets" (planets of the right temperature to support liquid water). All of the habitable zone candidates found thus far orbit stars significantly smaller and cooler than the Sun (habitable candidates around Sun-like stars will take several additional years to accumulate the three transits required for detection). Of all the new planet candidates, 68 are 125% of Earth's size or smaller, or smaller than all previously discovered exoplanets. "Earth-size" and "super-Earth-size" is defined as "less than or equal to 2 Earth radii (Re)" [(or, Rp ≤ 2.0 Re) – Table 5]. Six such planet candidates [namely: KOI 326.01 (Rp=0.85), KOI 701.03 (Rp=1.73), KOI 268.01 (Rp=1.75), KOI 1026.01 (Rp=1.77), KOI 854.01 (Rp=1.91), KOI 70.03 (Rp=1.96) – Table 6] are in the "habitable zone." A more recent study found that one of these candidates (KOI 326.01) is in fact much larger and hotter than first reported.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: The frequency of planet observations was highest for exoplanets two to three times Earth-size, and then declined in inverse proportionality to the area of the planet. The best estimate (as of March 2011), after accounting for observational biases, was: 5.4% of stars host Earth-size candidates, 6.8% host super-Earth-size candidates, 19.3% host Neptune-size candidates, and 2.55% host Jupiter-size or larger candidates. Multi-planet systems are common; 17% of the host stars have multi-candidate systems, and 33.9% of all the planets are in multiple planet systems.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: By December 5, 2011, the Kepler team announced that they had discovered 2,326 planetary candidates, of which 207 are similar in size to Earth, 680 are super-Earth-size, 1,181 are Neptune-size, 203 are Jupiter-size and 55 are larger than Jupiter. Compared to the February 2011 figures, the number of Earth-size and super-Earth-size planets increased by 200% and 140% respectively. Moreover, 48 planet candidates were found in the habitable zones of surveyed stars, marking a decrease from the February figure; this was due to the more stringent criteria in use in the December data.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: On December 20, 2011, the Kepler team announced the discovery of the first Earth-size exoplanets, Kepler-20e and Kepler-20f, orbiting a Sun-like star, Kepler-20.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: Based on Kepler's findings, astronomer Seth Shostak estimated in 2011 that "within a thousand light-years of Earth", there are "at least 30,000" habitable planets. Also based on the findings, the Kepler team has estimated that there are "at least 50 billion planets in the Milky Way", of which "at least 500 million" are in the habitable zone. In March 2011, astronomers at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) reported that about "1.4 to 2.7 percent" of all Sun-like stars are expected to have Earth-size planets "within the habitable zones of their stars". This means there are "two billion" of these "Earth analogs" in the Milky Way alone. The JPL astronomers also noted that there are "50 billion other galaxies", potentially yielding more than one sextillion "Earth analog" planets if all galaxies have similar numbers of planets to the Milky Way.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: In January 2012, an international team of astronomers reported that each star in the Milky Way may host "on average...at least 1.6 planets", suggesting that over 160 billion star-bound planets may exist in the Milky Way. Kepler also recorded distant stellar super-flares, some of which are 10,000 times more powerful than the 1859 Carrington event. The superflares may be triggered by close-orbiting Jupiter-sized planets. The Transit Timing Variation (TTV) technique, which was used to discover Kepler-9d, gained popularity for confirming exoplanet discoveries. A planet in a system with four stars was also confirmed, the first time such a system had been discovered.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: , there were a total of 2,321 candidates. Of these, 207 are similar in size to Earth, 680 are super-Earth-size, 1,181 are Neptune-size, 203 are Jupiter-size and 55 are larger than Jupiter. Moreover, 48 planet candidates were found in the habitable zones of surveyed stars. The Kepler team estimated that 5.4% of all stars host Earth-size planet candidates, and that 17% of all stars have multiple planets.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: According to a study by Caltech astronomers published in January 2013, the Milky Way contains at least as many planets as it does stars, resulting in 100–400 billion exoplanets. The study, based on planets orbiting the star Kepler-32, suggests that planetary systems may be common around stars in the Milky Way. The discovery of 461 more candidates was announced on January 7, 2013. The longer Kepler watches, the more planets with long periods it can detect.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: A candidate, newly announced on January 7, 2013, was Kepler-69c (formerly, "KOI-172.02"), an Earth-size exoplanet orbiting a star similar to the Sun in the habitable zone and possibly habitable.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: In April 2013, a white dwarf was discovered bending the light of its companion red dwarf in the KOI-256 star system.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: In April 2013, NASA announced the discovery of three new Earth-size exoplanets—Kepler-62e, Kepler-62f, and Kepler-69c—in the habitable zones of their respective host stars, Kepler-62 and Kepler-69. The new exoplanets are considered prime candidates for possessing liquid water and thus a habitable environment. A more recent analysis has shown that Kepler-69c is likely more analogous to Venus, and thus unlikely to be habitable.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: On May 15, 2013, NASA announced the space telescope had been crippled by failure of a reaction wheel that keeps it pointed in the right direction. A second wheel had previously failed, and the telescope required three wheels (out of four total) to be operational for the instrument to function properly. Further testing in July and August determined that while Kepler was capable of using its damaged reaction wheels to prevent itself from entering safe mode and of downlinking previously collected science data it was not capable of collecting further science data as previously configured. Scientists working on the Kepler project said there was a backlog of data still to be looked at, and that more discoveries would be made in the following couple of years, despite the setback.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: Although no new science data from Kepler field had been collected since the problem, an additional sixty-three candidates were announced in July 2013 based on the previously collected observations.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: In November 2013, the second Kepler science conference was held. The discoveries included the median size of planet candidates getting smaller compared to early 2013, preliminary results of the discovery of a few circumbinary planets and planets in the habitable zone.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: On February 13, over 530 additional planet candidates were announced residing around single planet systems. Several of them were nearly Earth-sized and located in the habitable zone. This number was further increased by about 400 in June 2014.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: On February 26, scientists announced that data from Kepler had confirmed the existence of 715 new exoplanets. A new statistical method of confirmation was used called "verification by multiplicity" which is based on how many planets around multiple stars were found to be real planets. This allowed much quicker confirmation of numerous candidates which are part of multiplanetary systems. 95% of the discovered exoplanets were smaller than Neptune and four, including Kepler-296f, were less than 2 1/2 the size of Earth and were in habitable zones where surface temperatures are suitable for liquid water.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: In March, a study found that small planets with orbital periods of less than one day are usually accompanied by at least one additional planet with orbital period of 1–50 days. This study also noted that ultra-short period planets are almost always smaller than 2 Earth radii unless it is a misaligned hot Jupiter.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: On April 17, the Kepler team announced the discovery of Kepler-186f, the first nearly Earth-sized planet located in the habitable zone. This planet orbits around a red dwarf.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: In May 2014, K2 observations fields 0 to 13 were announced and described in detail. K2 observations began in June 2014.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: In July 2014, the first discoveries from K2 field data were reported in the form of eclipsing binaries. Discoveries were derived from a Kepler engineering data set which was collected prior to campaign 0 in preparation to the main "K2" mission.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: On September 23, 2014, NASA reported that the "K2" mission had completed campaign 1, the first official set of science observations, and that campaign 2 was underway.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: Campaign 3 lasted from November 14, 2014, to February 6, 2015, and included "16,375 standard long cadence and 55 standard short cadence targets".


title: Kepler space telescope

text: By May 10, 2016, the Kepler mission had verified 1,284 new planets. Based on their size, about 550 could be rocky planets. Nine of these orbit in their stars' habitable zone:


title: Kepler space telescope

text: Kepler was launched in 2009. It was very successful at finding exoplanets, but failures in two of four reaction wheels crippled its extended mission in 2013. Without three functioning wheels, the telescope could not be pointed accurately. On October 30, 2018, NASA announced that the spacecraft was out of fuel and its mission was officially ended.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: In April 2012, an independent panel of senior NASA scientists recommended that the Kepler mission be continued through 2016. According to the senior review, Kepler observations needed to continue until at least 2015 to achieve all the stated scientific goals. On November 14, 2012, NASA announced the completion of Kepler's primary mission, and the beginning of its extended mission, which ended in 2018 when it ran out of fuel.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: In July 2012, one of Kepler's four reaction wheels (wheel 2) failed. On May 11, 2013, a second wheel (wheel 4) failed, jeopardizing the continuation of the mission, as three wheels are necessary for its planet hunting. Kepler had not collected science data since May because it was not able to point with sufficient accuracy. On July 18 and 22 reaction wheels 4 and 2 were tested respectively; wheel 4 only rotated counter-clockwise but wheel 2 ran in both directions, albeit with significantly elevated friction levels. A further test of wheel 4 on July 25 managed to achieve bi-directional rotation. Both wheels, however, exhibited too much friction to be useful. On August 2, NASA put out a call for proposals to use the remaining capabilities of Kepler for other scientific missions. Starting on August 8, a full systems evaluation was conducted. It was determined that wheel 2 could not provide sufficient precision for scientific missions and the spacecraft was returned to a "rest" state to conserve fuel. Wheel 4 was previously ruled out because it exhibited higher friction levels than wheel 2 in previous tests. Sending astronauts to fix Kepler is not an option because it orbits the Sun and is millions of kilometers from Earth.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: On August 15, 2013, NASA announced that Kepler would not continue searching for planets using the transit method after attempts to resolve issues with two of the four reaction wheels failed. An engineering report was ordered to assess the spacecraft's capabilities, its two good reaction wheels and its thrusters. Concurrently, a scientific study was conducted to determine whether enough knowledge can be obtained from Kepler's limited scope to justify its $18 million per year cost.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: Possible ideas included searching for asteroids and comets, looking for evidence of supernovas, and finding huge exoplanets through gravitational microlensing. Another proposal was to modify the software on Kepler to compensate for the disabled reaction wheels. Instead of the stars being fixed and stable in Kepler's field of view, they will drift. However, proposed software was to track this drift and more or less completely recover the mission goals despite being unable to hold the stars in a fixed view.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: In November 2013, a new mission plan named K2 "Second Light" was presented for consideration. K2 would involve using Kepler's remaining capability, photometric precision of about 300 parts per million, compared with about 20 parts per million earlier, to collect data for the study of "supernova explosions, star formation and Solar-System bodies such as asteroids and comets, ... " and for finding and studying more exoplanets. In this proposed mission plan, Kepler would search a much larger area in the plane of Earth's orbit around the Sun. Celestial objects, including exoplanets, stars and others, detected by the K2 mission would be associated with the EPIC acronym, standing for Ecliptic Plane Input Catalog.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: In early 2014, the spacecraft underwent successful testing for the K2 mission. From March to May 2014, data from a new field called Field 0 was collected as a testing run. On May 16, 2014, NASA announced the approval of extending the Kepler mission to the K2 mission. Kepler's photometric precision for the K2 mission was estimated to be 50 ppm on a magnitude 12 star for a 6.5-hour integration. In February 2014, photometric precision for the K2 mission using two-wheel, fine-point precision operations was measured as 44 ppm on magnitude 12 stars for a 6.5-hour integration. The analysis of these measurements by NASA suggests the K2 photometric precision approaches that of the Kepler archive of three-wheel, fine-point precision data.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: Field 1 of the K2 mission is set towards the Leo-Virgo region of the sky, while Field 2 is towards the "head" area of Scorpius and includes two globular clusters, Messier 4 and Messier 80, and part of the Scorpius–Centaurus association, which is only about 11 million years old and distant with probably over 1,000 members.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: On December 18, 2014, NASA announced that the K2 mission had detected its first confirmed exoplanet, a super-Earth named HIP 116454 b. Its signature was found in a set of engineering data meant to prepare the spacecraft for the full "K2" mission. Radial velocity follow-up observations were needed as only a single transit of the planet was detected.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: During a scheduled contact on April 7, 2016, Kepler was found to be operating in emergency mode, the lowest operational and most fuel intensive mode. Mission operations declared a spacecraft emergency, which afforded them priority access to NASA's Deep Space Network. By the evening of April 8 the spacecraft had been upgraded to safe mode, and on April 10 it was placed into point-rest state, a stable mode which provides normal communication and the lowest fuel burn. At that time, the cause of the emergency was unknown, but it was not believed that Kepler's reaction wheels or a planned maneuver to support "K2" Campaign 9 were responsible. Operators downloaded and analyzed engineering data from the spacecraft, with the prioritization of returning to normal science operations. Kepler was returned to science mode on April 22. The emergency caused the first half of Campaign 9 to be shortened by two weeks.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: In June 2016, NASA announced a K2 mission extension of three additional years, beyond the expected exhaustion of on-board fuel in 2018. In August 2018, NASA roused the spacecraft from sleep mode, applied a modified configuration to deal with thruster problems that degraded pointing performance, and began collecting scientific data for the 19th observation campaign, finding that the onboard fuel was not yet utterly exhausted.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: The Kepler team originally promised to release data within one year of observations. However, this plan was changed after launch, with data being scheduled for release up to three years after its collection. This resulted in considerable criticism, leading the Kepler science team to release the third quarter of their data one year and nine months after collection. The data through September 2010 (quarters 4, 5, and 6) was made public in January 2012.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: Periodically, the Kepler team releases a list of candidates (Kepler Objects of Interest, or KOIs) to the public. Using this information, a team of astronomers collected radial velocity data using the SOPHIE échelle spectrograph to confirm the existence of the candidate KOI-428b in 2010, later named Kepler-40b. In 2011, the same team confirmed candidate KOI-423b, later named Kepler-39b.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: Since December 2010, Kepler mission data has been used for the Planet Hunters project, which allows volunteers to look for transit events in the light curves of Kepler images to identify planets that computer algorithms might miss. By June 2011, users had found sixty-nine potential candidates that were previously unrecognized by the Kepler mission team. The team has plans to publicly credit amateurs who spot such planets.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: In January 2012, the BBC program "Stargazing Live" aired a public appeal for volunteers to analyse Planethunters.org data for potential new exoplanets. This led two amateur astronomers—one in Peterborough, England—to discover a new Neptune-sized exoplanet, to be named Threapleton Holmes B. One hundred thousand other volunteers were also engaged in the search by late January, analyzing over one million Kepler images by early 2012. One such exoplanet, PH1b (or Kepler-64b from its Kepler designation), was discovered in 2012. A second exoplanet, PH2b (Kepler-86b) was discovered in 2013.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: In April 2017, ABC "Stargazing Live", a variation of BBC "Stargazing Live", launched the Zooniverse project "Exoplanet Explorers". While Planethunters.org worked with archived data, Exoplanet Explorers used recently downlinked data from the K2 mission. On the first day of the project, 184 transit candidates were identified that passed simple tests. On the second day, the research team identified a star system, later named K2-138, with a Sun-like star and four super-Earths in a tight orbit. In the end, volunteers helped to identify 90 exoplanet candidates. The citizen scientists that helped discover the new star system will be added as co-authors in the research paper when published.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: Exoplanets discovered using "Kepler" data, but confirmed by outside researchers, include Kepler-39b, Kepler-40b, Kepler-41b, Kepler-43b, Kepler-44b, Kepler-45b, as well as the planets orbiting Kepler-223 and Kepler-42. The "KOI" acronym indicates that the star is a "K"epler "O"bject of "I"nterest.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: The Kepler Input Catalog is a publicly searchable database of roughly 13.2 million targets used for the Kepler Spectral Classification Program and the Kepler mission. The catalog alone is not used for finding Kepler targets, because only a portion of the listed stars (about one-third of the catalog) can be observed by the spacecraft.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: Kepler has been assigned an observatory code in order to report its astrometric observations of small Solar System bodies to the Minor Planet Center. In 2013 the alternative "NEOKepler" mission was proposed, a search for near-Earth objects, in particular potentially hazardous asteroids (PHAs). Its unique orbit and larger field of view than existing survey telescopes allow it to look for objects inside Earth's orbit. It was predicted a 12-month survey could make a significant contribution to the hunt for PHAs as well as potentially locating targets for NASA's Asteroid Redirect Mission. Kepler's first discovery in the Solar System, however, was , a 200-kilometer cold classical Kuiper belt object located beyond the orbit of Neptune.


title: Kepler space telescope

text: On October 30, 2018, NASA announced that the Kepler space telescope, having run out of fuel, and after nine years of service and the discovery of over 2,600 exoplanets, has been officially retired, and will maintain its current, safe orbit, away from Earth. The spacecraft was deactivated with a "goodnight" command sent from the mission's control center at the Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics on November 15, 2018. Kepler's retirement coincides with the 388th anniversary of Johannes Kepler's death in 1630.


title: Doping in Russia

text: Systematic doping of Russian athletes has resulted in 48 Olympic medals stripped from Russia (and Russian associated teams), four times the number of the next highest, and more than 30% of the global total. Russia has the most competitors who have been caught doping at the Olympic Games in the world, with more than 150.


title: Doping in Russia

text: Doping among Russian competitors is distinct from doping among nationals of other countries in that, rather than doping being an individual choice it is state-sponsored and systematic, with the Russian state being found to have supplied steroids and other drugs to athletes. Due to widespread violations of anti-doping regulations, including an attempt to sabotage ongoing investigations by the manipulation of computer data, the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) in 2019 banned the Russian Federation from all major sporting events - including the Olympic Games - for four years. In 2020 the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) reduced the ban period to two years following an appeal by Russia. Competitors from Russia meanwhile may take part in international competitions under a neutral flag and designation.


title: Doping in Russia

text: According to British journalist Andrew Jennings, a KGB colonel stated that the agency's officers had posed as anti-doping authorities from the International Olympic Committee (IOC) to undermine doping tests and that Soviet competitors were "rescued with [these] tremendous efforts". Regarding the 1980 Summer Olympics, a 1989 Australian study said, "There is hardly a medal winner at the Moscow Games, certainly not a gold medal winner, who is not on one sort of drug or another: usually several kinds. The Moscow Games might as well have been called the Chemists' Games."


title: Doping in Russia

text: Documents obtained in 2016 revealed the Soviet Union's plans for a statewide doping system in track and field in preparation for the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles. Dated prior to the country's decision to participate in the 1984 Summer Olympics boycott, the document detailed the existing steroids operations of the program, along with suggestions for further enhancements. The communication, directed to the Soviet Union's head of track and field, was prepared by Dr. Sergei Portugalov of the Institute for Physical Culture. Portugalov was also one of the main figures involved in the implementation of the Russian doping program prior to the 2016 Summer Olympics.


title: Doping in Russia

text: In 2008, seven Russian track and field athletes were suspended ahead of the Summer Olympics in Beijing for manipulating their urine samples.


title: Doping in Russia

text: Multiple Russian biathletes were involved in doping offences in run-up to the 2010 Winter Olympics. The president of the International Biathlon Union, Anders Besseberg, said, "We are facing systematic doping on a large scale in one of the strongest teams of the world."


title: Doping in Russia

text: Reviewing 7,289 blood samples from 2,737 competitors from 2001 to 2009, a report found that the number of suspicious samples from "Country A" notably exceeded other countries. One of the authors said that Country A was Russia.


title: Doping in Russia

text: In October 2009, International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) general secretary Pierre Weiss wrote to Valentin Balakhnichev that blood samples from Russian athletes "recorded some of the highest values ever seen since the IAAF started testing" and that tests from the 2009 World Championships "strongly suggest a systematic abuse of blood doping or EPO-related products".


title: Doping in Russia

text: In 2010, an employee at the Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA), Vitaly Stepanov, began sending information to the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) alleging that RUSADA was enabling systemic doping in athletics. He said that he sent two hundred emails and fifty letters over the course of three years. In December 2012, Darya Pishchalnikova sent an email to WADA containing details of an alleged state-run doping program in Russia. According to "The New York Times", the email reached three top WADA officials but the agency decided not to open an inquiry but instead forwarded her email to Russian sports officials. In April 2013, having failed a doping test for the second time (after a previous two-year doping ban in 2008–2010), Pishchalnikova was banned by the Russian Athletics Federation (RusAF) for ten years, in a move that was likely in retaliation. Her results from May 2012 were annulled, thus setting her on track to lose her Olympic medal. British journalist Nick Harris said that he contacted the IOC with allegations about Grigory Rodchenkov's laboratory in Moscow in early July 2013.


title: Doping in Russia

text: According to Stepanov, "Even at WADA there were people who didn't want this story out," but he said that a person at the organization put him in contact with the German broadcaster ARD. WADA's chief investigator Jack Robertson believed that the organization was reluctant to take action and that media attention was necessary, so he obtained the permission of WADA's director-general, David Howman, to approach an investigative reporter called Hajo Seppelt, who had previously reported on doping in East Germany and other countries. In December 2014, ARD aired Seppelt's documentary, ""Geheimsache Doping: 'Wie Russland seine Sieger macht'" ("The Doping Secret: 'How Russia Creates its Champions'")", which uncovered alleged Russian state involvement in systematic doping, describing it as "East German-style". In the documentary, Stepanov and his wife Yuliya Stepanova (née Rusanova), claimed that Russian athletics officials had supplied banned substances in exchange for 5% of an athlete's earnings and had also falsified tests in cooperation with doping control officers. It included conversations that had been secretly recorded by Stepanova, e.g. Russian athlete Mariya Savinova saying that contacts at a Moscow drug-testing laboratory had covered up her doping. Russian long-distance runner Liliya Shobukhova allegedly paid €450,000 to cover up her positive doping result. According to the allegations, Dr. Sergei Portugalov of the Institute for Physical Culture, who stands accused of organising state-sponsored doping in the Soviet Union, dating back to the early 1980s, was also involved in the recent Russian doping programme.


title: Doping in Russia

text: In January 2015, then-All-Russia Athletic Federation President Valentin Balakhnichev resigned as treasurer of the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF).