--- title: NASA: Planet-Huntering Kepler Telescope Discovers Planet on Comeback description: The discovery marks a remarkable turnaround for Kepler canonical: https://time.com/3641539/nasa-kepler-planet/ author: TIME Staff article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2014-12-19T06:37:22.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-08-04T08:00:11.088Z article:section: Science og:title: NASA’s Planet Hunter Discovers Planet og:description: The discovery marks a remarkable turnaround for Kepler. og:url: https://time.com/3641539/nasa-kepler-planet/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt1a49b8cf39744d64/69877013cd68483bfe098bf2/rtr3e1vj.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1399 og:image:height: 787 og:image:alt: Nasa image of an artist's conception of the tiny new planet Kepler-37b og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: NASA’s Planet Hunter Discovers Planet twitter:description: The discovery marks a remarkable turnaround for Kepler. twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt1a49b8cf39744d64/69877013cd68483bfe098bf2/rtr3e1vj.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # NASA’s Kepler Telescope Discovers Another Planet on Comeback > Sponsored content. 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It reaches 40,000 subscribers with a 34.2% open rate and a 2.1% click rate as of August 2026. #### Where can I follow the energy transition as a business story? Future Proof covers climate and energy as an economic and business story rather than only an environmental one. It publishes every Friday and is free at time.com/newsletters. #### Who writes Future Proof? Justin Worland, a senior correspondent at TIME and an award-winning climate journalist, writes Future Proof. #### Is Future Proof free? Yes. Future Proof is free at time.com/newsletters. ## Video: Phone Home: NASA's Call Center [Watch (HLS stream): Phone Home: NASA's Call Center](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/uGQRvwuW.m3u8) (3:48)  _Published 2014-01-08. NASA has been communicating with astronauts and spacecraft via the Deep Space Network for over 50 years._ by [TIME Staff](https://time.com/author/time-staff/) ## TIME Staff Dec 19, 2014 6:37 AM UTC  An artist's conception of the tiny new planet Kepler-37b, which is slightly larger than Earth's moon and orbits its host star every 13 days, in this image released by NASA, Feb. 20, 2013 An artist's conception of the tiny new planet Kepler-37b, which is slightly larger than Earth's moon and orbits its host star every 13 days, in this image released by NASA, Feb. 20, 2013 NASA/Reuters by [TIME Staff](https://time.com/author/time-staff/) ## TIME Staff Dec 19, 2014 6:37 AM UTC NASA’s Kepler spacecraft has [found](http://www.nasa.gov/press/2014/december/nasa-s-kepler-reborn-makes-first-exoplanet-find-of-new-mission/#.VJPCFALYJA) another new planet. Dubbed HIP 116454b, the new body is bigger than Earth, smaller than Neptune and probably too hot to sustain life as we know it. “The Kepler mission showed us that planets larger in size than Earth and smaller than Neptune are common in the galaxy, yet they are absent in our solar system,” Steve Howell, a project scientist at NASA’s Ames Research Center in California, said in statement. The discovery marks a remarkable turnaround for Kepler. In May 2013, one of Kepler’s stabilizing reaction wheels failed and a team of engineers and scientists were forced to fashion an ingenious alternative for controlling the spacecraft, using pressure generated from sunlight. During a subsequent test run in February, Kepler collected data on a previously undiscovered planet 180 light-years from Earth. Follow-up observations confirmed the existence of the planet, which astronomers have called a watery “mini-Neptune,” with a tiny core and gaseous atmosphere, [reports](http://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/19/science/kepler-spacecraft-finds-new-planet.html?%5Fr=0) the New York _Times._ ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3641539/nasa-kepler-planet/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3641539/nasa-kepler-planet/"},"headline":"NASA’s Kepler Telescope Discovers Another Planet on Comeback","datePublished":"2014-12-19T06:37:22.000Z","dateModified":"2026-08-04T08:00:11.088Z","description":"The discovery marks a remarkable turnaround for Kepler","url":"https://time.com/3641539/nasa-kepler-planet/","keywords":["astronomy","Space","NASA","Kepler","Telescope"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt1a49b8cf39744d64/69877013cd68483bfe098bf2/rtr3e1vj.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"TIME Staff","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/time-staff/"}],"articleSection":"Science","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt1a49b8cf39744d64/69877013cd68483bfe098bf2/rtr3e1vj.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Nasa image of an artist's conception of the tiny new planet Kepler-37b","caption":"Nasa image of an artist's conception of the tiny new planet Kepler-37b","creditText":"NASA/Reuters","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/science/","name":"Science"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/astronomy/","name":"astronomy"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/3641539/nasa-kepler-planet/","name":"NASA’s Kepler Telescope Discovers Another Planet on Comeback"}}]},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"VideoObject","name":"Phone Home: NASA's Call Center","description":"NASA has been communicating with astronauts and spacecraft via the Deep Space Network for over 50 years.","thumbnailUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/v2/media/uGQRvwuW/poster.jpg?width=720","uploadDate":"2014-01-08T18:10:36.000Z","contentUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/uGQRvwuW.m3u8","embedUrl":"https://time.com/3641539/nasa-kepler-planet/","duration":"PT3M48S","potentialAction":{"@type":"SeekToAction","target":"https://time.com/3641539/nasa-kepler-planet/?jw_start={seek_to_second_number}","startOffset-input":"required name=seek_to_second_number"}}] ```