Recipes for a solar system

摘要

Yawn—ten new planets have been discovered in orbit around other stars. The discoveries, announced this week at the general assembly of the International Astronomical Union (iau) in Manchester, bring the number of known extrasolar planets to 50. The ingenuity of planet-hunting astronomers, who identify their quarry from the subtle wobbling of parent stars, is now such that what was once headline-grabbing news has become almost commonplace.