DIY exoplanet detector

Since 1995, when astronomers announced the discovery of a planet orbiting the star 51 Pegasi, exoplanets¿¿¿ which orbit stars other than the sun¿¿¿have been a hot topic. I knew that dedicated amateurs could detect some of these exoplanets, but I thought it required expensive telescopes. Then I stumbled on the website of the KELT -North project at Ohio State University, in Columbus. The project¿¿¿s astronomers find exoplanets not with a giant telescope but by combining a charge-coupleddevice (CCD) detector with a Mamiya-Sekor lens originally designed for high-end cameras. That got me wondering: Might I be able to detect an exoplanet without a telescope or a research-grade CCD detector? ¿¿¿ I discovered that one amateur astronomer had already posted online about how he had detected a known exoplanet using a digital single-lens reflex (DSLR) camera outfitted with a telephoto lens. He was able to discern the dip in the brightness of a star as an orbiting planet passed in front of it¿¿¿a technique known as transit detection.