Worlds Unnumbered: The Search for Extrasolar Planets

Discusses the century-long search for planets outside our solar system, including the October 1995 announcement of the first discovered by astronomers and an explanation of where more planets might be found.

In this golden age of astronomy, new discoveries have proliferated in the past year: life on Mars, an ocean on Europa, and planets around other stars. On the heels of Goldsmith's The Hunt for Life on Mars comes this exciting account of the new planets. Because they cannot be seen, sophisticated methods are being utilized to study these planets, methods that Goldsmith cogently explains in terms of the instruments and reasoning used to claim a new discovery. The burning curiosity, of course, is whether the newcomers could support life: the answer is no; most are gigantic and too close to their stars, and an earth-size planet found orbiting a pulsar would obviously be a crispy critter. Such facts surprised astronomers, upsetting their favored theory of planet formation, possible revisions of which Goldsmith reports with the enthusiasm and clarity essential to popular works. Two dozen colorplates, some imagining the appearance of the new planets, gussy up a wonderful science acquisition for libraries. Gilbert Taylor