By Dean Murray

The official number of planets outside our solar system has reached 6,000, according to space scientists.

NASA's tally of exoplanets does not include more than 8,000 additional candidate planets awaiting confirmation.

The milestone has been reached during monitoring for extraterrestrial life by NASA’s Exoplanet Science Institute (NExScI), based at Caltech’s IPAC in Pasadena, California.

Confirmed planets are added to the count on a rolling basis by scientists from around the world, so no single planet is considered the 6,000th entry.

NASA said Wednesday, Sept. 17 they are "leading the world in searching for life in the universe."

Shawn Domagal-Goldman, acting director, Astrophysics Division, NASA Headquarters, said: "This milestone represents decades of cosmic ex

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