Here Planet Planet Planet...

     Distant planets are incredibly difficult to find, so thus to better understand them it is incredibly important to obtain some knowledge of how we find them. To get an idea of just how difficult it is to find new planets, despite living within our own solar system, it took well into the 1800's to find the 3rd and 4th largest planets and to this date we are still finding planets on the outer rim of our home.
     So if it takes so much effort to find those bodies that are right under our nose on a galactic scale,  how do we find planets that are magnitudes of distance further away. Luckily for us, we know where the stars are, we do not need to find stars like we do with the menagerie of dwarf planets that circle our sun. There are multiple ways in which a planet can affect the star which it circles around, for instance if a planet is large enough and the star is close enough to us, we can observe slight alterations in its spin. Imagine it like a top, if there is a slight flaw on the edge of the top, at some level the top will wobble slightly.
      There are of course better ways, the primary of which involves monitoring the amount of light produced by a star.  Watch this video about the Kepler mission to find planets in the habitable zone from NASA.


 

     So you will have noticed that the problem with the Kepler mission is that we don't get pictures. People inherently want visible data in order to feel an affirmation of their goals so it is the goal of scientists to fill the knowledge deficit with society. The main question with this is can we actually get pictures of these bodies and the simple answer is yes. Back in between 2004 and 2006 Hubble was used successfully used to capture an image of Fomalhaut-b. While it was known that there was the possibility of planets in this system, the picture marks the first time that humanity has been able to see another planet.
   

May the stars shine brightly in your skies!