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Palanan
2014-01-08, 10:38 PM
When Marcy and Butler first reported their work on 51 Pegasi b, back in the day, it was a fantastic time; Galileo was just exploring the Jovian system, and for the optimistic dreamers among us, the nearest corners of the galaxy seemed to be finally opening up.

I used to be all over this field, keeping up with John Whatmough's tally on his website and reading new books as they came out. Alas, that was many years ago, and the current total of extrasolar worlds--twelve hundred, fifteen hundred, sixteen hundred?--is absolutely boggling.

Can anyone recommend the best current summary, if there is such a thing, of the state of extrasolar planetary discoveries? The 3 May 2013 issue of Science had several articles (http://www.sciencemag.org/content/340/6132.toc) on the topic--the cover story, in fact--and survey papers are fine, but I'm really looking for a solid book-length narrative that reviews the history of recent discoveries and summarizes the current field. Is there something like that out there?

JoshL
2014-01-08, 11:11 PM
Don't know if there's a book out there yet, or even a good up to date summary. Did you catch this: http://www.gemini.edu/node/12113

We have taken a picture of an exoplanet. Mindboggling. And that's not even talking about the astounding work Kepler's been doing (http://kepler.nasa.gov/ is the place I keep up with that).

Would be an excellent time to write a book on the subject, if there are any Astronomers in the Playground!