When it comes to directly imaging Earth-like exoplanets orbiting faraway stars, seeing isn't always believing.

A new Cornell study finds that next-generation telescopes used to see exoplanets could confuse Earth-like planets with other types of planets in the same solar system.

With today's telescopes, dim distant planets are hard to see against the glare of their host stars, but next-generation tools such as the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope, currently under development by NASA, will be better at imaging Earth-like planets, which orbit stars at just the right distance to offer prime conditions for life.

"Once we have the capability of imaging Earth-like planets, we're actually going to have to worry about confusing them with completely different types of planets," said Dmitry Savransky, associate professor in the Sibley School of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering (College of Engineering) and the Department of Astronomy (College of Arts and Sciences).

When Nicole Oliveira was just learning to walk, she would throw up her arms to reach for the stars in the sky.

Today, at just eight years of age, the Brazilian girl is known as the world's youngest astronomer, looking for asteroids as part of a NASA-affiliated program, attending international seminars and meeting with her country's top space and science figures.

In Oliveira's room, filled with posters of the solar system, miniature rockets and Star Wars figures, Nicolinha, as she is affectionately known, works on her computer studying images of the sky on two large screens.

The project, called Asteroid Hunters, is meant to introduce young people to science by giving them a chance to make space discoveries of their own.