The new NASA spacecraft, which was sent to space in search of alien planets, has sent its first photo from up there and it is completely awe-inspiring.
NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) spacecraft was sent to space back in April in order to search the galaxy for exoplanets. It has now sent its first photo from the space showing uncountable star-filled sky.
According to NASA, the picture, captured by one of the satellite’s four cameras, features more than 200,000 stars but is only a fraction of the number that the spacecraft will eventually study to know about exoplanets.
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According to Mashable, NASA informed, “TESS is expected to cover more than 400 times as much sky as shown in this image with its four cameras during its initial two-year search for exoplanets.”
Passing the moon, the image is only a two-second exposure by one of TESS’ four cameras and NASA believes that the satellite will provide its first ‘science-quality image’ sometime in June, reported CNET.
In total, the spacecraft’s field of view will contain around 20 million starts that can be host to unknown planets. Researchers believe that this satellite will be able to discover minimum of 50 planets around Earth’s size during its two-year-long mission.