Sun’s stroke keeps Kepler online

Space telescope beats mechanical failures to begin a second mission that will trace new celestial targets.

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The Rho Ophiuchi cloud, a star-forming nebula, is being observed by the Kepler space telescope. ( Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Harvard-Smithsonian CfA)

The crippled Kepler space telescope is unexpectedly enjoying a second lease of life. The exoplanet-hunting probe will now cast its gaze on star clusters, the centre of the Milky Way and the Solar System’s outer planets as it scans a ribbon of the cosmos for the next three years. This month it has been gazing at gas clouds shrouding infant stars in the constellations Scorpius and Ophiuchus. (Credit: Mark Zastrow)

via Nature

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