NASA confirmed on September 17 the discovery of 6,000 exoplanets, also known as "alien planets." This is a landmark achievement in the search for worlds beyond our own. These distant planets range from massive gas giants orbiting extremely close to their stars, to fiery lava worlds and even those shrouded in exotic gemstone clouds.
With future missions such as the Roman Space Telescope and the Habitable Worlds Observatory on the horizon, scientists are moving closer to identifying Earth-like planets and perhaps even evidence of life.
The search for alien life is something that has gripped the world for decades. While telescopes point up at the sky and scan the recesses of space, probes like Voyager 1 are traveling incredible distances in the hopes of finding extraterrestrial life. But where can such life be found? What are the ideal conditions for aliens to live in? And how similar would their planets be to ours?
Click through this gallery to find the answers hidden in interstellar space.