Three exoplanets have been 'lost', here's what's the deal

Even before we had sophisticated technology at hand, we have been keen to look at the skies to uncover its secrets. As tech developed, we realised that what we could see was just a fraction of what was out there. We continued to gaze into the space nonetheless.

One of main thrusts of our skywatching has been to find exoplanets, and some that would possibly harbour life! But everything doesn't always go according to plan and our observations sometimes are not that accurate. That's life we suppose.

Astronomers have 'lost' three exoplanets. This means that these three space objects, previously considered to be exoplanets are not planets at all.

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The objects Kepler-854b, Kepler-840b, and Kepler-699b have appeared to be too big to be exoplanets. So what are they?

Scientists think that they are stars!

Another object, Kepler-747b is considered to be a borderline case to qualify as a planet.

How are exoplanets discovered?

Planets may be notoriously hard to spot as, unlike stars, they do not emit their own light. So how are they found?

We can spot the light coming from a star. When a planet comes in between the star and us, there is a slight decrease or 'dip' in the light caught by our sophisticated lenses pointed at the sky.

As the tech is advancing, we are making use of newer techniques to accurately find exoplanets.