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Growing up, you might have learned the names of the planets.

Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter.

But what about Beta Pictora C? You probably didn't learn that one.

I didn't either.

That's because we only found out about it in 2019.

And because it's an extra solar planet or an exoplanet.

Well, an exoplanet is a planet, but it doesn't orbit the sun.

It orbits some other star in the galaxy.

That's Josh Wynne. He's an astronomer at Princeton University and an exoplanet hunter.

And the study of exoplanets is one of the newest and most exciting areas of astronomy. It really only got going in the mid-1990s.

Scientists have found thousands of exoplanets since then,

by relying on a little trick of gravity.

When a planet is orbiting a star,

it's because the star's gravity is pulling on the planet.

But forces come in pairs.

If the star is pulling on the planet,

the planet has to be pulling on the star with the same force. Compared to the planet, the star is pulling on the planet, the planet has to be pulling on the star with the same force.

Compared to the planet, the star is massive.

So the pull of gravity from the planet doesn't make it move much.

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