Johannes Kepler

Hello! My name is Johannes Kepler. When I was a little boy, I loved to look up at the night sky. The moon, the stars, and the wandering planets were my favorite things to watch. I always wondered: how do they all move up there?

Everyone in my time thought the planets traveled in perfect circles around the sun, like a perfectly round pizza. But I watched them very, very carefully for a long time. My numbers told me something different! I discovered that the planets don't move in circles. They move in a shape that is more like a stretched-out circle, called an oval. It was a very big discovery!

Figuring out that planets travel in ovals helped everyone understand our amazing solar system so much better. It was like finding a secret map to the stars. I lived to be 58 years old, and I am so happy that my ideas still help scientists today explore the great, big universe.