Exoplanet scale

Venus transits the Sun on June 5, 2012 as observed by the Solar Dynamics Observatory in 171 Angstrom light.Credit: NASA/SDO Imagery and spectra of the stars in the Pleiades as captured by K2.Credit: NASA/K2/Aarhus University/T.White Proposed TESS Guest Investigator topics.Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center Proposed TESS Guest Investigator topics.Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center Proposed TESS Guest Investigator topics. With number of proposals in each category.Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center Animation of how TESS will survey the sky.Credit: MIT Animation of TESS's path into its long-term orbit and what that final orbit will look like.Credit: MIT Animation of TESS's two phases while in orbit. During HASO--or high-altitude science operations--the spacecraft is farther from Earth and is capturing science data with its cameras. As it nears its closest approach to Earth, it switches to LAHO--low-altitude housekeeping operations--and rotates to transmit and recieve data from the ground.Credit: MIT Related pages