Planet hunters spy distant haul
The ice-giant Gliese 436 is 30 light years from Earth
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A haul of 28 new planets beyond our solar system has been detected by the world's most prolific planet hunters.
The finds were among 37 objects seen orbiting distant stars by a US and Anglo-Australian team in the last year.
Other objects reported by the group, at an American Astronomical Society meeting in Honolulu, included five failed stars, known as brown dwarfs.
The finds increase the total number of known exoplanets to 236, more than half of which were discovered by the team.
"The more we look, the more we find planets," said Professor Tinney of the University of New South Wales, head of the Australian part of the Anglo-Australian Planet Search.
clipped from: news.bbc.co.uk