Posted on 02/23/2018 9:21:36 PM PST by MtnClimber
Despite being only 4.3 light-years away from Earth, the trio of stars comprising Alpha Centauri still holds a lot of mysteries. It being the closest star system to us, you'd think we'd have teased out most of its secrets by now, but in fact we're still learning basic stuff about it.
We know some of the basics, of course. The system has two stars that orbit each other in a binary, one of which (called Alpha Centauri A) is much like the Sun and the other (Alpha Cen B) is a tad smaller and cooler. Nearby is a third star, Proxima Centauri, a low-mass and cool red dwarf, that by happenstance is somewhat closer to us, on the near side of the system.......
In that same year, though, astronomers announced a planet detected orbiting Proxima, and that one has stood the test of time. Proxima Centauri b, or just Proxima b for short, is a planet with at least 1.3 times as much mass as Earth, and orbits Proxima once every 11.2 days. That means it's very close to the star, about 7 million kilometers out, but Proxima is such a dim bulb that the planet gets about the same amount of heat we do from the Sun. We don't know much else about it, but just knowing it exists is a big deal.
(Excerpt) Read more at syfy.com ...
That's one helluva short year.
Just need better tires. :)
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