How Engineers Modified the Spitzer Telescope to Probe Exoplanets
This artist's concept shows Spitzer surrounded by examples of
exoplanets the telescope has examined. Image Credit: NASA/JPL-
Caltech.  Now approaching its 10th anniversary, NASA's Spitzer
Space Telescope has evolved into a premier observatory for an
endeavor not envisioned in its original design: the study of
worlds around other stars, called exoplanets.   "When Spitzer
launched back in 2003, the idea that we would use it to study
exoplanets was so crazy that no one considered it," said Sean
Carey of NASA's Spitzer Science Center at the California
Institute of Technology in Pasadena. "But now the exoplanet
science work has become a cornerstone of what we do with the
telescope."  Spitzer views the universe in the infrared light
that is a bit less energetic than the light our eyes can see.
Infrared light can easily pass through stray cosmic gas and
dust, allowing researchers to peer into dusty stellar nurseries,
the centers of galaxies, and newly