"I do have a preference."
Posted on 02/02/2006 9:25:14 PM PST by neverdem
I think we're getting reports of larger-than-Jupiter worlds and closer-than-Mercury giants because of the limits of the observing technology, which has been improving all the time since the late 1990s, when the first confirmed extrasolar planet was discovered.
The issues raised by these seemingly anomalous systems are real ones, however. :')
http://seds.lpl.arizona.edu/nineplanets/nineplanets/other.html
"Observations of the very nearby Barnard's Star were once thought to be evidence of gravitational effects of planets but they now seem to have been in error."
They found another 10th planet yesterday?
Yes.
And as detection becomes easier and better refined, we may find that our style solar system is more common.
But with Jupiter, Staurn, Uranus, and Nptune in our solar system, how come ours didn't end up mosty toasty like others?
That's probably a question broiling in the backs of some minds at the moment.
(Perhaps our sun was a bit of a stellar oddball and put enough outward pressure to keep things from infalling early on?)
Thanks.
Yeah, What would make it'frosting on the cake' would be to find we are living in a binary star system with a brown dwarf secondary star orbiting our primary star..
That would be something to hear about.
Here's a picture from the Hubble space telescope.
"What would make it'frosting on the cake' would be to find we are living in a binary star system with a brown dwarf secondary star orbiting our primary star."
I'll settle for a stable wormhole. :-)
My pleasure. Thanks for the link to the Moving Orbits topic. :')
It must be getting late, as I stared at that for about seven seconds, and then began laughing.
My brain is slowing down.
It's just a special place;
Here's a picture from the Hubble space telescope.
One of the planet's inhabitants.
2003 UB313 is currently the fifteenth-largest known Solar System object, with a diameter larger than those of Pluto and the neptunian moon Triton, but smaller than those of Earth's Moon and Titan, the largest of Saturn's satellites. Other objects, besides the eight undisputed major planets, that are larger than 2003 UB313 are Jupiter's satellites Callisto, Io, Europa (not pictured) and Ganymede (the largest moon in the Solar System). Behind Pluto, the next-largest known trans-neptunian objects are 2005 FY9, with a diameter of about 1,800 km, and Sedna (1,700 km). A handful more are larger than Ceres, the largest asteroid in the main asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter. .
Oh, drat. Ceres already exists?
Now I need to pick out another name.
How tedious!
Thanks for the link.
Do they make heavenly body bowling balls? A Ganymede bowling ball would be sweet.
It's so lonely out there!
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