Distant Worlds — Addressing the Search for Exoplanets with Analogy Experiments

About This Paper

Fremde Welten ("Distant Worlds") surveys the range of analogy experiments developed by the astro-lab.app project and situates them within the lower secondary physics curriculum in Germany. The paper argues that the search for exoplanets provides an exceptionally rich context for teaching fundamental physics concepts — light, pressure, temperature, and measurement uncertainty — because the astronomical context motivates the measurements and makes abstract quantities concrete.

The article includes curriculum mapping, didactic analysis, and practical guidance for teachers who want to incorporate exoplanet topics into regular physics lessons without specialist equipment beyond smartphones.

Published In

Naturwissenschaften im Unterricht Physik, 34(2), pp. 33–36, 2023. https://elibrary.utb.de/doi/abs/10.5555/up-194-2023_08