FASTER, PLEASE: 1,284 new exoplanets, thanks to new method of verifying Kepler’s discoveries.

Scientists have verified in one sweep 1,284 new planets that were discovered by NASA’s planet-hunting telescope Kepler, thanks to a new statistical analysis technique developed at Princeton University.

This doubles the number of exoplanets, or planets orbiting their own stars outside of our solar system, that Kepler has discovered since it was first launched in 2009.

“Before the Kepler space telescope launched, we did not know whether exoplanets were rare or common in the galaxy,” Paul Hertz, the astrophysics division director at NASA, said in a statement. “Thanks to Kepler and the research community, we now know there could be more planets than stars.”

There are approximately 100 billion stars in the Milky Way galaxy.