17 Sep 11
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1296841/More-100-Earth-like-planets-just-past-weeks.html
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Ok, I'm going back to last year, as I only just dicovered this.
If the date on the paper was 1st April, fools day, I'd be sceptical.
I still am.
Does anybody have any kind of verification of this kind of data, that so many planets, and even earth-like ones have really been discovered.
I'm interested to know.
Thnx in advance,
-m.
17 Sep 11
Originally posted by mikelomWhat they do is to time the small change of light received and when it goes back to its regular intensity. That small change allows them to time how long it takes for the planet in question to pass in front of the star. Knowing that and having a decent estimate of the mass of the star allows them to calculate the distance from the star to the planet and then to get the mass of the planet. Then they can calculate how many watts per square meter reaches the planet from that star and to figure if they are in the "Goldilocks' zone, the distant from the star that allows liquid water to be on the surface without either evaporating or freezing out.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1296841/More-100-Earth-like-planets-just-past-weeks.html
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Ok, I'm going back to last year, as I only just dicovered this.
If the date on the paper was 1st April, fools day, I'd be sceptical.
I still am.
Does anybody have any kind of verification of this kind of data, that so many planets, and eve ...[text shortened]... -like ones have really been discovered.
I'm interested to know.
Thnx in advance,
-m.
At that point they don't have any other tricks to apply, they can just say this is a planet of such and such mass and it is in a zone where liquid water could appear. Now if that planet has no atmosphere, there will be no liquid water so if there is water it would by definition have to be buried underground.
Likewise if it was a large gaseous planet, there may not be much in the way of liquid water if it was something like a hot Neptune with a rocky core buried under a thousand miles of thick atmosphere in which case the incoming starlight would not reach down far and underneath all that the temperature would probably be way too high for liquid water to appear.
All that stuff depends on details we can't suss out at this point in time. All we can say for sure is the planet is in a zone where, if it were a rocky planet like Earth and has a decent atmosphere (which does not have to have any oxygen in it) but just enough pressure that allows liquid water to exist on the surface. That's all they can say at this point in our astronomical development.
17 Sep 11
2 edits
Originally posted by sonhouseBTW, if you are using a mac and can't hear tunes on myspace like I gave you for my own myspace account, I found this free download:
What they do is to time the small change of light received and when it goes back to its regular intensity. That small change allows them to time how long it takes for the planet in question to pass in front of the star. Knowing that and having a decent estimate of the mass of the star allows them to calculate the distance from the star to the planet and th xist on the surface. That's all they can say at this point in our astronomical development.
http://download.cnet.com/Audio-Hijack/3000-2170_4-10174235.html
This is from Cnet so it should be virus free. It downloads for free and gives you 15 day trial period. See if that works.
17 Sep 11
Originally posted by mikelomThe article itself does not match its headline.
Ok, I'm going back to last year, as I only just dicovered this.
If the date on the paper was 1st April, fools day, I'd be sceptical.
I still am.
Does anybody have any kind of verification of this kind of data, that so many planets, and even earth-like ones have really been discovered.
The articles says 100 planets the same size as earth have been found in the past few weeks, but only about 60 are expected to be found in the next few years that are 'habitable Earth-like planets' by which they probably mean they would be in the 'goldilocks' zone.
18 Sep 11
Originally posted by sonhouseExcept they are not planets - and detecting moons of planets outside our solar system is not something we have yet achieved.
For that matter, the moon, Titan, Io, Europa are all close enough mass wise to be considered Earth like. Titan even has a denser atmosphere than Earth and has rain. Even if it is methane.
We have however detected Jupiter sized planets around other suns, and presumably some of them have 'earth like' moons.
18 Sep 11
Originally posted by twhiteheadWhat amazes me is the amount of Jovian planets with thick atmospheres like Jupiter but are a few million miles from their sun.
Except they are not planets - and detecting moons of planets outside our solar system is not something we have yet achieved.
We have however detected Jupiter sized planets around other suns, and presumably some of them have 'earth like' moons.
Those planets are roasting and it must be because of the immense gravity they retain an atmosphere, with temps in the thousands of degrees C some of them.
It's really curious why so many stars have such close ordered Jovian sized monsters so close to them. One in ten, one in a hundred wouldn't seem out of the ordinary but there are dozens and that is only the closest stars we can analyze so it must mean there are millions of them in the whole milky way. So there must be billions of them if you count up all the other galaxies we can see.
They must have formed in the outer edge where it is cold but thrown in by some other body, passing star? Another Jovian planet getting too close?
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18 Sep 11
1 edit
Originally posted by sonhousethere are a number of posited explanations.
What amazes me is the amount of Jovian planets with thick atmospheres like Jupiter but are a few million miles from their sun.
Those planets are roasting and it must be because of the immense gravity they retain an atmosphere, with temps in the thousands of degrees C some of them.
It's really curious why so many stars have such close ordered Jovian cold but thrown in by some other body, passing star? Another Jovian planet getting too close?
one of which is friction from the planetary disc dust cloud before the relevant star kicks into gear and blasts it away.
But there are a number of alternatives.
However you have to be careful extrapolating too much at this stage, as there is a significant selection effect in your detection methods.
The dopplar shift method of planet detection, that looks for a tiny wobble in the parent star is far more likely to detect large objects and
objects with short period orbits.
Hot Jupiter's have both short orbit periods and are massive thus making them the easiest and fastest planets to detect.
Stellar dimming technique is better for detecting small stuff, but the downside is that the planets in question have to orbit in a plane that
means they pass between us and their parent star.
However detecting a gas giant orbiting in a stars habitable zone is very promising for life, as it is (based on all the gas giants in our solar
system) very likely to have multiple moons, which could potentially be suitable for life.
EDIT: Also if I recall there is another option that suggests the hot Jupiter got into gravity resonance with the inner planets and
threw them out the solar system while it moved inwards....
19 Sep 11
1 edit
Originally posted by googlefudgeYeah, both methods of planet detection are at their technological limit as it is now. Future probes will change that for the better plus larger scopes in space will eventually be used like the multiples on Earth, hooked together like radio telescopes are now which, if they are a million miles apart will gain so much resolution they will be able to detect planets pretty much anywhere in the galaxy and possibly in Andromeda as well.
there are a number of posited explanations.
one of which is friction from the planetary disc dust cloud before the relevant star kicks into gear and blasts it away.
But there are a number of alternatives.
However you have to be careful extrapolating too much at this stage, as there is a significant selection effect in your detection methods.
esonance with the inner planets and
threw them out the solar system while it moved inwards....
I would assume that kind of development would not come about till century 22 though.
Do you know if any of the triple in Alpha Centauri has shown planets? Like you said, they may not be in line with us and so the dimming method would be out but the wobble thing should work. It would seem to me that trinary would be the first one to test out the wobble effect being so darn close. Or perhaps Sirius, at only 8 Ly away. That star doesn't look like a good bet for a planet with life even if it was in the goldilocks zone which would be considerably further out from Sirius than for Sol considering it would have a lot more UV than Sol.
In my work with gravitational lenses with emphasis on lensing done by Sol, Sirius has some serious power no pun intended🙂 If you measure the radiation directly here it amounts to about ten nanowatts per square foot or about 1/10th of a microwatt per square meter right here. So if you had 10 billion square meters of collecting area you would get 1000 watts right here next to Earth. Of course that would have to be on the moon or in space, our atmosphere would kill most of that. Obviously 10 billion square meters, 3 km on a side, would generate terawatts if aimed at the sun but still, to get 1000 watts from a STAR! That is something.
19 Sep 11
Originally posted by sonhouseWhy? What would it require that we don't already have? Surely if it works for radio telescopes then it can be done for optical just as easily as soon as the optical scopes go digital? (which I assume they are already).
I would assume that kind of development would not come about till century 22 though.
20 Sep 11
Originally posted by twhiteheadYup...
Why? What would it require that we don't already have? Surely if it works for radio telescopes then it can be done for optical just as easily as soon as the optical scopes go digital? (which I assume they are already).
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1287333/Scientists-use-worlds-powerful-digital-camera-hunt-dark-matter.html
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20 Sep 11
Originally posted by VoidSpiritThat's hardly misleading. In all aspects that we can detect from as far away as another star, Venus is very much like Earth. If we lived on a planet dozens of lightyears away, we wouldn't be able to tell whether Venus or Earth is the inhabitable planet.
it's a bit misleading. venus is an 'earth-like' planet as well.
If there's one thing misleading, it's journalists not understanding how scientists uses these terms, but pretending they do. But that's nothing new.
Richard
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21 Sep 11
Originally posted by Shallow Bluethat's not necessarily true, if we detect a planet via occlusion, you can see the
That's hardly misleading. In all aspects that we can detect from as far away as another star, Venus is very much like Earth. If we lived on a planet dozens of lightyears away, we wouldn't be able to tell whether Venus or Earth is the inhabitable planet.
If there's one thing misleading, it's journalists not understanding how scientists uses these terms, but pretending they do. But that's nothing new.
Richard
spectral lines of absorption from the planets atmosphere.
This tells you an awful lot about its composition and temperature.
That said the phrase is often used in reference to the planets size rather than other
characteristics.