Kepler: launch of the planet hunter!

[ankh_hpl]

This news from science_at_nasa  is a couple of days old, but I can't resist the idea of humanity finally having some chance of finding Earthlike planets orbiting other stars.    NASA's Kepler spacecraft launched successfully from Cape Canaveral on Friday night, March 6th.  I may be posting about this mission again, since various Colorado agencies and companies are involved -- I live fairly close to where the earliest stages of the mission are being monitored. 

I've had a fascination with planet-hunting for some time.  Last spring, my villanelle "Sifting Stars" (about  a similar search using Earth-based telescopes) appeared in Astropoetica.    You can still read it here.