page_title: European Southern Observatory
section_title: Search for extrasolar planets
hierarchical_section_title: European Southern Observatory / ESO telescopes: research and discoveries / Search for extrasolar planets
caption_attribution_description: Afrikaans: Die Baie Groot Teleskoop (BGT) van die ESO se Paranalsterrewag in Chili staan op die voorgrond in hierdie beeld. Die ryk sterreagtergrond sluit die helder dubbelster Alpha Centauri in, wat saam met Proxima Centauri die naaste sonnestelsel aan die Aarde vorm. Einde 2016 het die ESO 'n ooreenkoms onderteken met Breakthrough Initiatives om die BGT-instrumentasie aan te pas vir 'n soektog na planete in die Alpha Centauri-stelsel. Sulke planete kan teikens word vir miniatuur-ruimteprobes wat uiteindelik deur die Breakthrough Starshot-inisiatief gelanseer kan word. Etlike suidelike sterrebeelde word ook aangedui. English: The foreground of this image shows ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT) at the Paranal Observatory in Chile. The rich stellar backdrop to the picture includes the bright star Alpha Centauri, the closest stellar system to Earth. In late 2016 ESO signed an agreement with the Breakthrough Initiatives to adapt the VLT instrumentation to conduct a search for planets in the Alpha Centauri system. Such planets could be the targets for an eventual launch of miniature space probes by the Breakthrough Starshot Initiative.
context_page_description: The European Organisation for Astronomical Research in the Southern Hemisphere, commonly referred to as the European Southern Observatory, is a 16-nation intergovernmental research organisation for ground-based astronomy. Created in 1962, ESO has provided astronomers with state-of-the-art research facilities and access to the southern sky. The organisation employs about 730 staff members and receives annual member state contributions of approximately €162 million. Its observatories are located in northern Chile.
  ESO has built and operated some of the largest and most technologically advanced telescopes. These include the 3.6 m New Technology Telescope, an early pioneer in the use of active optics, and the Very Large Telescope, which consists of four individual 8.2 m telescopes and four smaller auxiliary telescopes which can all work together or separately. The Atacama Large Millimeter Array observes the universe in the millimetre and submillimetre wavelength ranges, and is the world's largest ground-based astronomy project to date. It was completed in March 2013 in an international collaboration by Europe, North America, East Asia and Chile.
context_section_description: "Is there life elsewhere in the universe?" is one of humankind's most profound unanswered questions. A step in the attempt to answer this question is the search for planets outside the Solar System. ESO's observatories are equipped with an arsenal of instruments for finding, studying, and monitoring extrasolar planets. In 2004, the Very Large Telescope detected a faint glow from an apparent planet orbiting a star about 200 light-years from earth. A year later, this detection was confirmed as the first picture of an exoplanet ever recorded. Although the planet is large (five times more massive than Jupiter), this observation is a first step toward identifying the physical structure and chemical composition of exoplanets.
  Despite the fact that planets seem very common in the universe they are tiny, faint objects at cosmic scales; this makes their detection difficult with current technology. For this reason, most exoplanets have been detected with indirect methods. Of these, the most successful has been the radial velocity method. HARPS (the High Accuracy Radial-velocity Planet Searcher) has allowed the discovery of a number of planets with masses below that of Neptune orbiting nearby stars. However, few of these planets are among the smallest ever discovered, or reside in its star's habitable zone. The possibility exists that one of these planets is covered by oceans; this discovery is an encouraging result in the search for planets which could support life.
  The Danish 1.54-metre telescope at La Silla participated in the discovery of one of the most Earth-like planets found to date. The planet, detected using the microlensing technique and about five times as massive as Earth, circles its parent star in about 10 years and most certainly has a rocky and icy surface.
  In 2017, Breakthrough Initiatives and the European Southern Observatory (ESO) entered a collaboration to enable and implement a search for habitable planets in the nearby star system, Alpha Centauri. The agreement involves Breakthrough Initiatives providing funding for an upgrade to the VISIR (VLT Imager and Spectrometer for mid-Infrared) instrument on ESO's Very Large Telescope (VLT) in Chile. This upgrade will greatly increase the likelihood of planet detection in the system.
  In August 2016, the European Southern Observatory announced the detection of a planet orbiting the third star in the Alpha Centauri system, Proxima Centauri. The planet, called Proxima Centauri b, could be a potential target for one of the projects of Breakthrough Initiatives.
  Breakthrough Starshot is a proof of concept mission to send a fleet of ultra-fast light-driven nanocraft to explore the Alpha Centauri star system, which could pave the way for a first launch within the next generation. An objective of the mission would be to make a fly-by of and possibly photograph any Earth-like worlds that might exist in the system.
  In March 2019, ESO astronomers, employing the GRAVITY instrument on their Very Large Telescope Interferometer (VLTI), announced the first direct detection of an exoplanet, HR 8799 e, using optical interferometry.
caption: The Very Large Telescope and the star system Alpha Centauri.[90]
exif: {"Image ImageDescription": "The foreground of this image shows ESO\u2019s Very Large Telescope (VLT) at the Paranal Observatory in Chile. The rich stellar backdrop to the picture includes the bright star Alpha Centauri, the closest stellar system to Earth. In late 2016 ESO signed an agreement with the Breakthrough Initiatives to adapt the VLT instrumentation to conduct a search for planets in the Alpha Centauri system. Such planets could be the targets for an eventual launch of miniature space probes by the Breakthrough Starshot Initiative.", "Image Software": "Adobe Photoshop CC 2017 (Windows)", "Image DateTime": "2017:01:05 13:17:21"}