Up to now, the International Astronomical Union has been kind of a party pooper when it comes to planetary bodies. They demoted Pluto. Later, they stopped one of Pluto's moons from being named after everybody's favorite Star Trek: OS character. Then they scolded the startup Uwingu for soliciting creative names for exoplanets from the public, instead sticking with more official names such as PSR B1620-26 b and HD 209458 b. Catchy, right?
As if you needed any more encouragement to visit alien planets. NASA's been searching high and low for extrasolar planets—the Kepler Space Telescope recently found it's 1,000th exoplanet. And in case you're having trouble deciding which one you'd like to visit first, the agency has put out a trio of posters, in the style of the U.S.'s old Works Progress Administration, advertising the wonders in store for travelers beyond our solar system.
