The CoRoT (Convection, Rotation and planetary Transits) telescope was a space telescope mission led by the French Space Agency (CNES) that operated from 2006 to 2014.

It was the first spacecraft dedicated to the detection of exoplanets using the transit method and also studied the internal structure of stars through asteroseismology.

Key mission details

Launch:

CoRoT was launched on December 27th 2006, aboard a Russian Soyuz 2.1b rocket.

Orbit:

It operated in a low-Earth, circular polar orbit at an altitude of approximately 900 kilometers.

Instrumentation:

The spacecraft featured a 27-centimeter diameter telescope with a wide-field camera consisting of four Charge-Coupled Device (CCD) detectors.

Method:

Exoplanet detection:

It identified exoplanets by continuously monitoring a star's brightness, looking for the tiny, periodic dimming that occurs when a planet crosses in front of it.

Asteroseismology:

The telescope also measured "starquakes," or acoustic waves rippling across a star's surface, which allowed scientists to determine its mass, age, and chemical composition.

End of Mission:

A computer failure in November 2012 prevented data retrieval. After unsuccessful repair attempts, the mission was officially decommissioned and de-orbited in June 2014.

Legacy and discoveries

CoRoT was a groundbreaking mission that paved the way for later, more advanced exoplanet-hunting probes like NASA's Kepler and TESS missions.

Notable discoveries include:

CoRoT-1b:

The first exoplanet detected by the mission in 2007.

CoRoT-7b:

The first confirmed rocky exoplanet outside our solar system.

CoRoT-9b:

The first known temperate transiting exoplanet, located in an orbit comparable to Mercury's.

What specific aspect of the CoRoT telescope's mission or discoveries would you like to know more about? For instance, we could dive deeper into its discoveries, how its technology influenced future missions, or the details of its asteroseismology findings.