It looks like you're using an Ad Blocker.
Please white-list or disable AboveTopSecret.com in your ad-blocking tool.
Thank you.
Some features of ATS will be disabled while you continue to use an ad-blocker.
With a mass about 11 times that of Jupiter and an orbit about 650 times greater than the average Earth-Sun distance, newfound planet HD 106906 b, the UA astronomers say, is throwing a wrench into existing planet-formation theories.
"This system is especially fascinating because no model of either planet or star formation fully explains what we see," said research leader Vanessa Bailey, who is a fifth-year graduate student at UA's Department of Astronomy.
Bailey and her colleagues' research on planet HD 106906 b has been accepted for publication in The Astrophysical Journal.
The team was able to confirm that the planet is moving together with its host star by examining Hubble Space Telescope data taken eight years prior for another research program. Using the FIRE spectrograph, also installed at the Magellan telescope, the team confirmed the planetary nature of the companion. "Images tell us an object is there and some information about its properties but only a spectrum gives us detailed information about its nature and composition," explained co-investigator Megan Reiter, a graduate student in the UA Department of Astronomy. "Such detailed information is rarely available for directly imaged exoplanets, making HD 106906 b a valuable target for future study."
Read more at: phys.org...
smithas05
Just goes to show that the current paradigm in astronomy really doesn't explain everything. I have always had an inkling of a thought that a large portion of the currently accepted theories about space and the universe should be held in that regard... theories. until we can traverse the cosmos (farther than earth orbit) we will never really know if these theories are right.
There are alot of people (that i know, and on ATS) who take the current theories as 100 percent proof. I guess when people with Ph'D's and the like say something their word is law.
good post. S&F
just shows once again that just cause some suppose scientist says something we can,t take it as fact.we have to accept what we think we know is just going on guess work.they base everything on what they know about this planet,not actually what could be possible elsewhere.
snarky412
Not sure if this has been posted, did a search but it came up blank.
Astronomers from the University of Arizona have discovered a distant exoplanet with a set of characteristics so bizarre that they say it should not even exist.
With a mass about 11 times that of Jupiter and an orbit about 650 times greater than the average Earth-Sun distance, newfound planet HD 106906 b, the UA astronomers say, is throwing a wrench into existing planet-formation theories.
"This system is especially fascinating because no model of either planet or star formation fully explains what we see," said research leader Vanessa Bailey, who is a fifth-year graduate student at UA's Department of Astronomy.
Bailey and her colleagues' research on planet HD 106906 b has been accepted for publication in The Astrophysical Journal.
Massive Newfound Planet Defies Traditional Planetary Formation Theories
The existence of planet HD 106906 b does not coalesce with leading planet formation theories.
The planet is too far from its star to have formed from colliding asteroid bodies as the star was first coming to life, and the planet is too massive to have formed from gasses in the primordial disk of its forming star - typically the primordial disk, at such a distance from the star itself, does not have enough material to support the formation of such a large planet.
It is thought that planets close to their stars, like Earth, coalesce from small asteroid-like bodies born in the primordial disk of dust and gas that surrounds a forming star. However, this process acts too slowly to grow giant planets far from their star. Another proposed mechanism is that giant planets can form from a fast, direct collapse of disk material. However, primordial disks rarely contain enough mass in their outer reaches to allow a planet like HD 106906 b to form.
This new planet is estimated to be about 13 million years old and this young planet still glows from the residual heat of its formation.
Where Earth was formed about 4.5 billion years ago.
The team was able to confirm that the planet is moving together with its host star by examining Hubble Space Telescope data taken eight years prior for another research program. Using the FIRE spectrograph, also installed at the Magellan telescope, the team confirmed the planetary nature of the companion. "Images tell us an object is there and some information about its properties but only a spectrum gives us detailed information about its nature and composition," explained co-investigator Megan Reiter, a graduate student in the UA Department of Astronomy. "Such detailed information is rarely available for directly imaged exoplanets, making HD 106906 b a valuable target for future study."
Read more at: phys.org...
edit on 5-12-2013 by snarky412 because: (no reason given)
snarky412
smithas05
Mother Nature will shake us off like fleas when she gets ready. No way we will ever know all there is about this Universe or beyond
edit on 5-12-2013 by snarky412 because: (no reason given)
My best guess is that mother nature knows better than ignorance. If it was to be a being, a living person, what do you think she could tells us about what happened on this planet for the last 200,000 years ???
She could demystify every lies and truth being spread in the world !
Thruthseek3r
WonOunce
I was thinking the same thing since (Jupiter) is thought to be a failed star, so that would mean something with 11x it's mass would also be a failed star. I guess it just couldn't create fusion and was doomed to float around in the dark.