Posted on 03/22/2012 11:14:22 PM PDT by U-238
U.S. scientists studying "runaway" stars tossed out of our galaxy at great velocities say they've confirmed the same thing can happen to planets.
The first runaway star was discovered seven years ago, heading out of the Milky Way at 1.5 million mph, and new research says planets must be doing the same thing -- at speeds up to 30 million mph, the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics reported Thursday.
"These warp-speed planets would be some of the fastest objects in our galaxy," astrophysicist Avi Loeb said. "If you lived on one of them, you'd be in for a wild ride from the center of the galaxy to the universe at large."
So-called hypervelocity planets are produced in the same way as hypervelocity stars, researchers said.
A double-star system wanders too close to the supermassive black hole at the galactic center, where strong gravitational forces rip the stars from each other, sending one away at high speed while the other is captured into orbit around the black hole.
The researchers modeled what would happen if each star had an orbiting planet or two and found the star ejected outward could carry its planets along for the ride, while a star captured by the black hole could have its planets torn away and flung into interstellar space at tremendous speeds.
"Other than subatomic particles, I don't know of anything leaving our galaxy as fast as these runaway planets," study lead author Idan Ginsburg of Dartmouth College said.
(Excerpt) Read more at upi.com ...
Ping
A runaway planet? Is it too early to put Romney on one?
I imagine if you were on one of those planets it would also become very cold, very quickly.
Great story though! I really like reading these sort of articles, it’s nice to get a break from politics once in a while :)
LOL
That’s 1/22 (or 4.48%) the speed of light... That’s pretty darn fast!
It seems gravity can’t help me now,
I’m out too far, I’m spinning out
This time I’ve really led myself astray...
Runaway planet, never goin back...
Wrong way on a one-way track
Seems like I should be orbiting somewhere
Somehow I’m neither here nor there
Still a far cry from the Star Trek “slingshot maneuver” we’ll need to pull off to go back to 2008 and stop Obama :(
It's all relativistic. At that speed our four year, nominally 1461 day, presidential term would be time dilated to 1495 days. This current term feels much longer than that, more like two terms, which would require 19/22 c speed via time dilation. Thus this ***** President beats a ***** Hole.
Its being ejected by a supermassive black hole. Maybe some of these planets are still probably in orbit around their parent stars.
I agree with you.
We have a super massive black ***hole for a president.
I doubt that you would notice.
The torsional tidal forces exerted on the planet when it was torn away from its sun would be such that the mantel of the planet would be cracked like someone roll in a hard boiled egg between there palms. There would be little left on the surface of the planet uncrushed. The gravitational shear may tear the atmosphere from the planet.
Space 1999 anyone?
ROFLMAO
If you want to make the story line plausible, you could posit the existence of high geothermal heat at the planet’s core making it somewhat warm but still, of course, dark on the surface.
I’m a-walkin’ in the rain,
Tears are fallin’ and I feel the pain,
Wishin’ you were here by me,
To end this misery
And I wonder—
I wah-wah-wah-wah-wonder,
Why,
Why, why, why, why, why she ran away,
Yes, and I wonder,
A-where she will stay-ay,
My little runaway,
Run, run, run, run, runaway.
Run, run, run, run, runaway.
Run, run, run, run, runaway.
lol...
Sometimes I wopnder how much money is tossed at studying things we can do nothing about and really don’t matter in the great scheme of things.
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