00:00In galaxies far, far away, we've discovered so much since the turn of the century.
00:06Space telescopes have given us views we could only dream of.
00:10We've learned more about black holes than ever before,
00:13and we've discovered exoplanets, giving us a whole new look at the universe.
00:19With the development of social media,
00:21some of the greatest moments were shared with billions of people globally, and in seconds.
00:31Black holes are some of the most wondrous objects in space,
00:36and there could be more than 100 million of them in the Milky Way.
00:41The Event Horizon Telescope collaboration in 2019
00:44captured the first image of the intriguing beast.
00:48The closest to Earth, Gaia BH1, is 1,560 light-years away
00:55and has a mass around 9.6 times that of the Sun.
00:59Since the beginning of the decade, astronomers and scientists have made incredible discoveries,
01:04helping us better understand all we need to know about these supermassive stunners.
01:14The first exoplanet was discovered in 1992,
01:18and since then, the hunt has been on to find more, especially if Earth has a twin.
01:24In 2001, a planet with an orbit around the Sun
01:27at a similar distance from it as Earth was uncovered,
01:30and in a location where life might be able to exist.
01:35The next two decades, more and more exoplanets were found
01:38with similar composition, size, and orbit as Earth,
01:43with some scientists highlighting the discovery of Kepler-186f in 2014
01:49in another star's habitable zone.
01:52In the last 25 years, a variety of space telescopes were launched with different frequencies,
01:57including infrared game-changers Spitzer in 2003 and James Webb in 2021,
02:03to allow astronomers and scientists to find out
02:06and learn more about exoplanets than ever before.
02:10More missions were embarked on globally,
02:12with space telescopes creating cloud maps, discovering other planet systems,
02:17and capturing portraits of galaxies we never knew existed.
02:21To date, NASA says there have been more than 5,000 exoplanets
02:25located and confirmed of the billions just in our galaxy.
02:35In addition to black holes and exoplanets,
02:37since 1999, the astronomical discoveries have been,
02:41full pun intended, out of this world.
02:44We've learned more about other planets in our solar system than ever before,
02:48and other ones in the Milky Way that are similar.
02:51Spacecraft have visited comets, and researchers have discovered them.
02:56We've brought samples back from asteroids
02:59and even detected the first gravitational waves in space.
03:04In 2021, NASA's Parker Solar Probe made history
03:09as the first spacecraft created by humans to enter the Sun's atmosphere.
03:15With the creation and popularity of social media,
03:20we get to experience space exploration on a whole new level.
03:25In the 2000s, Internet sites and apps became a place
03:28to connect with the space industry within seconds,
03:31allowing users to upload thoughts, photos, and videos,
03:34and publish with just the click of a button.
03:37NASA astronaut Mike Massimino said the first tweet from space in 2009
03:43connecting billions of people on Earth with those in orbit.
03:47Want to know what spacecraft like NASA's Perseverance Mars rover
03:51and SpaceX's Starlink satellites are up to?
03:54Just check their social media pages.
03:57The latest on space exploration can be just a click away.
04:01There is so much more to discover,
04:04and the world is our oyster,
04:07or perhaps just one of the many, many galaxies to explore.
04:11For Space.com, I'm Meredith Garfalo.
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