28 Oct 2003 Corning Incorporated to Manufacture Primary Mirror for NASA's Space-Based Kepler Photometer, Corning Press Release regarding mirror

23 Oct 2003. Utah Researchers Aid in Search for Other Earths. Greg Lavine, The Salt Lake Tribune. This is a brief reference in the context of modeling planets

23 Oct 2003. Corning Joins NASA Mission, Smriti Jacobs, Rochester Business Journal

16 Oct 2003. Lunacy: Finding New Moons (adapted from an ESA Press Release): Astrobiology Magazine

16 Oct 2003. Habitability: Betting on 37 Gem, Astrobiology Magazine.

9 Oct 2003. On The Edge: Is Anybody Out There? by Diane Stresing at space.com. The Earth really unique in its ability to support life? Right now, that's a $300 million question. When NASA's Kepler Mission launches in 2007, we may find the answer. Started more than a decade ago, the Kepler Mission (http://www.kepler.arc.nasa.gov/index.html) is the first program to search for Earth-sized planets. What's more, it will look for planets that, based on their orbits, are capable of supporting life.

6 Oktober 2003 SUCHE NACH DER ZWEITEN ERDE - "Sie dürfen niemals blinzeln" "Kepler"-Weltraumteleskop auf die Jagd nach erdähnlichen Planeten schicken. Im Interview mit SPIEGEL ONLINE erklärt der Astrophysiker und "Kepler"-Mitarbeiter David Koch, wie er den unsichtbaren Trabanten auf die Schliche kommen will. ---NASA "Kepler"-Teleskop (Illustration): Knifflige Suche nach Exoplaneten
SPIEGEL ONLINE: Herr Koch, auf dem Internationalen Astronautik-Kongress in Bremen haben Sie die Pläne der Nasa vorgestellt, mit "Kepler" auf Planetenjagd zu gehen. Wieso brauchen wir ein neues Satellitenteleskop, wenn mit irdischen Fernrohren bereits rund hundert Exoplaneten gefunden wurden?
Koch: Von der Erde aus haben wir Exo-Gasriesen gefunden, ähnlich dem Jupiter in unserem Planetensystem. Jupiter ist etwa 300-mal schwerer als die Erde. Wir wollen aber auch Exoplaneten finden, die eine vergleichbare Größe haben wie unsere Erde. Dafür sind die bisherigen erdgebundenen Methoden jedoch zu unempfindlich. ....

2 Oct 2003. Antarctic Astronomy: Exoplanet Hunt Moves Way Down Under, by Diane Richards, SETI Institute. Sometimes being left out in the cold is a good thing. Or so thinks SETI Institute astrophysicist, Dr. Douglas Caldwell, whose planet hunting team has set up shop in one of the most cold, remote areas of the planet, the South Pole. (space.com) Also found at SETI website and here.

Sep. 04, 2003 Solar Transits: Tools of Discovery, by Edna DeVore - SETI Institute Director of Education and Public Outreach. Most people think of the local bus or tram service when transit is mentioned. But talk to an astronomer, and you'll hear an entirely different definition. Astronomically, we observe transits when a planet crosses the face of the Sun, or an extrasolar planet crosses the face of its parent star. When the planet passes through our line of sight (LOS) to the Sun, we see the transit progress as a small, dark dot moving against the brilliance of the Sun. From our point of view on Earth, both Mercury and Venus can transit the Sun when the LOS is right. This is not a frequent event. During the 21st century, Mercury will transit the Sun only 14 times even though its orbit carries it past the Earth about every 115 days. That means that out of almost 3200 possible line-ups between Earth-Mercury-Sun in this century, only 14 times does Mercury lie along our LOS to the Sun resulting in a transit. Venus is farther from the Sun than Mercury, and the opportunity to see a transit of Venus is much more rare. In fact, over the next two centuries, there will be only four transits of Venus across the Sun: June 8, 2004, June 6, 2012, December 11, 2117 and December 8, 2125. The remainder of the time, Venus and Mercury are above or below the Sun as they pass between the Earth and Sun.
Full article at SETI Institute site or at Space.com site

5 Jun 2003. USA Today. Is there another Earth out there somewhere?

12 Mar 2003. Too Close for Comfort: Hubble Discovers an Evaporating Planet. Astronomers using NASA's Hubble Space Telescope have observed for the first time the atmosphere of a planet beyond our solar system evaporating into space. Most of the planet may eventually disappear, leaving only a dense core. The evaporating planet is a member of a type of planet called a "hot Jupiter," a giant gaseous planet that orbits very closely around its parent star, drawn to it like a moth to a flame. The scorched planet, called HD 209458b, orbits only 4 million miles (7 million kilometers) from its yellow, Sun-like star. The planet circles the parent star in a tight 3.5-day orbit. The Hubble observations reveal a hot and bloated hydrogen atmosphere, which is evaporating off the planet. This huge envelope of hydrogen resembles a comet with a tail trailing behind the planet. Release Number: STScI-2003-08

Apr 2003. Heaven and earths. Article in California Monthly, by Ayala Ochert. About Geoff Marcy--search for planets.