EXOPLANETARY  SCIENCE

This new rapidly-growing field of scientific research is devoted not just to finding exoplanets but to discovering and analysing detailed information about them.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-24348024

This report presents fascinating observations on an exoplanet Kepler-7b, which circles a star some 1,000 light years from Earth using Nasa's Spitzer and Kepler space telescopes. Brice-Olivier Demory of MIT interprets the measurements as a reflective signature of clouds on the exoplanet. Variations of the intensity of light from the parent star reflected from the exoplanet clouds yield information about the planetary cloud cover.

If this approach is extended to other (and closer to Earth) exoplanets among the hundreds of these planets already discovered beyond our solar system the research may reveal significant discoveries.