00:00In galaxies far, far away, we've discovered so much since the turn of the century.
00:05Space telescopes have given us views we could only dream of.
00:09We've learned more about black holes than ever before,
00:12and we've discovered exoplanets, giving us a whole new look at the universe.
00:18With the development of social media,
00:20some 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,
00:35and there could be more than 100 million of them in the Milky Way.
00:40The Event Horizon Telescope collaboration in 2019 captured the first image of the intriguing beast.
00:47The closest to Earth, Gaia BH-1, is 1,560 light-years away
00:54and has a mass around 9.6 times that of the Sun.
00:58Since 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 at 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 with similar composition, size, and orbit as Earth,
01:42with some scientists highlighting the discovery of Kepler-186f in 2014 in another star's habitable zone.
01:51In 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,
02:02to allow astronomers and scientists to find out and learn more about exoplanets than ever before.
02:09More missions were embarked on globally, with space telescopes creating cloud maps,
02:14discovering other planet systems, and capturing portraits of galaxies we never knew existed.
02:20To date, NASA says there have been more than 5,000 exoplanets located and confirmed of the billions just in
02:29our galaxy.
02:34In addition to black holes and exoplanets, since 1999, the astronomical discoveries have been,
02:41full pun intended, out of this world.
02:43We'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 and even detected the first gravitational waves in space.
03:03In 2021, NASA's Parker Solar Probe made history as the first spacecraft created by human to enter the sun's atmosphere.
03:17With the creation and popularity of social media, we get to experience space exploration on a whole new level.
03:25In the 2000s, internet sites and apps became a place to connect with the space industry within seconds,
03:31allowing users to upload thoughts, photos, and videos, and publish with just the click of a button.
03:37NASA astronaut Mike Massimino sent the first tweet from space in 2009, connecting billions of people on Earth with those
03:46in orbit.
03:47Want to know what spacecraft like NASA's Perseverance Mars rover and SpaceX's Starlink satellites are up to?
03:54Just check their social media pages.
03:56The latest on space exploration can be just a click away.
04:00There 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.
04:14.
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