The first discoveries of extrasolar planets are announced by astronomers Aleksander Wolszczan and Dale Frail. They discovered two planets orbiting the pulsar PSR 1257+12.

An exoplanet or extrasolar planet is a planet outside of the Solar System. The first confirmed detection of an exoplanet was in 1992 around a pulsar, and the first detection around a main-sequence star was in 1995. A different planet, first detected in 1988, was confirmed in 2003. In 2016, it was recognized that the first possible evidence of an exoplanet had been noted in 1917. As of 7 August 2025, there are 5,972 confirmed exoplanets in 4,460 planetary systems, with 1,000 systems having more than one planet. In collaboration with ground-based and other space-based observatories the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) is expected to give more insight into exoplanet traits, such as their composition, environmental conditions, and planetary habitability.

Aleksander Wolszczan is a Polish astronomer. He is the co-discoverer of the first confirmed extrasolar planets and pulsar planets. He is a graduate of the Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń and works as a professor at the Pennsylvania State University.

Dale A. Frail is a Canadian astronomer working at the National Radio Astronomy Observatory (NRAO) in Socorro, New Mexico.

PSR B1257+12, alternatively designated PSR J1300+1240, is a millisecond pulsar, 2,300 light-years from the Sun, in the constellation Virgo, rotating at about 161 times per second. It is also named Lich, after a powerful, fictional undead creature.

January 9 is the ninth day of the year in the Gregorian calendar; 356 days remain until the end of the year.