Six New Planets Reported

Tom Awtry
Tom Awtry
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Topic 189814

Quote:

Six new planets reported

August 31, 2005
(PLANETQUEST) -- Scientists announced the discoveries of six new extrasolar planets during the latter half of August, found at distances ranging from 20 to 289 light-years from Earth, according to information posted on the Extrasolar Planets Encyclopedia website.

The largest is about 1.6 times as massive as Jupiter. The smallest is about as massive as Uranus, or about 14 times the mass of Earth. The planets orbit their parent stars at distances ranging from 10 million to 3 million miles (16 million to 5 million kilometers) -- much closer than the distance at which Mercury orbits our sun.

The new planets are described in papers submitted to the European journal Astronomy and Astrophysics. More details on these discoveries will be reported on this site as they become available.

A bit of perhaps interesting reading came into the e-mail account today, that I would appreciate comments on, if they should relate in some way to E@H.

____________________
Regards,
Tom

MarkF
MarkF
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Six New Planets Reported

I don't think so. E@H is looking for signals coming from lopsided neutron stars. Still it is interesting, do you have a link?

klasm
klasm
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Planets orbiting a star do

Planets orbiting a star do generate gravitational waves but they are much too weak to be detected by any existing detector. So E@H will not be affected by this discovery. But is is nice news still.

Tom Awtry
Tom Awtry
Joined: 18 Jul 05
Posts: 100
Credit: 520861
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RE: Six new planets

Quote:
Six new planets reported

Klasm & Mark – Thanks for the postings and informative comments concerning the discovery of these new planets. Frankly, I didn’t feel there would be much of a relationship to gravitational waves in my posting, but I selfishly would like to see more postings related to the sciences of Astronomy and Astro Physics here within the "Science" thread.

Mark, the link to this article is ( http://planetquest.jpl.nasa.gov/news/sixPlanets.html )

Again, a sincere thanks for your time, comments and interest.

____________________
Regards,
Tom

Tom Awtry
Tom Awtry
Joined: 18 Jul 05
Posts: 100
Credit: 520861
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RE: Changes in Saturn Rings

Quote:

Changes in Saturn Rings Baffle Scientists

By ALICIA CHANG, AP Science Writer Mon Sep 5, 7:18 PM ET

LOS ANGELES - New observations by the international Cassini spacecraft reveal that Saturn's trademark shimmering rings, which have dazzled astronomers since Galileo's time, have dramatically changed over just the past 25 years.

Among the most surprising findings is that parts of Saturn's innermost ring — the D ring — have grown dimmer since the Voyager spacecraft flew by the planet in 1981, and a piece of the D ring has moved 125 miles inward toward Saturn.

While scientists puzzle over what caused the changes, their observations could reveal something about the age and lifetime of the rings.

Cassini-related discoveries were discussed Monday at a meeting of the American Astronomical Society's division of planetary sciences in Cambridge, England.

"I don't think Saturn's rings will disappear anytime soon, but this tells us how the rings are evolving and how long they might last, " deputy project scientist Linda Spilker said in a telephone interview from England.

Scientists are interested in Saturn's rings because they are a model of the disk of gas and dust that initially surrounded the sun. Studying them could yield important clues about how the planets formed from that disc 4.5 billion years ago.

The ring observations were made this summer. The $3.3 billion Cassini mission, funded by NASA and the European and Italian space agencies, was launched in 1997. Cassini is managed by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena.

Of course Saturn is not a newly discovered planet, but I didn’t want to create a new, separate thread for what I consider an interesting Astronomy article I recently picked up on. The link, including a picture is here.

Chipper Q
Chipper Q
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RE: Of course Saturn is not

Message 16197 in response to message 16196

Quote:
Of course Saturn is not a newly discovered planet, but I didn’t want to create a new, separate thread for what I consider an interesting Astronomy article I recently picked up on. The link, including a picture is here.


Hi Tom,

Thanks for the post. I tried to click on the link, but it pulled up an error page stating that the requested story may have expired.

I recall reading a recent article that said astronomers have known for some time that the inner ring was composed of particles too small to last (they evaporate away?), and that something must be replenishing the ring, and that Cassini had just snapped a shot of a tiny chunck of ice that likely solved the mystery. Can't find the article right now, but I found these two:
Snowball fight shapes Saturn's rings
And most recently, probably what you mentioned:
Scientists baffled by changes in Saturn's rings

Interesting developments...

MarkF
MarkF
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This link is also similar to

This link is also similar to the Tom's original posting:
Cassini

klasm
klasm
Joined: 20 Feb 05
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You might enjoy this report

You might enjoy this report about a pulsar which is in the process of "eating" its companion star
ESA

Tom Awtry
Tom Awtry
Joined: 18 Jul 05
Posts: 100
Credit: 520861
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Uncovered another interesting

Uncovered another interesting article on Space.com, entitled Astronomers Find Infant Version of our Solar System. The new Solar System was discovered by NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope.

Enjoy,
Tom

Tom Awtry
Tom Awtry
Joined: 18 Jul 05
Posts: 100
Credit: 520861
RAC: 0

Klasm, Mark &

Klasm, Mark & Chipper,

Thanks for your contributions and my apologies for not responding with any gratitude this past week. I’ve read each of your interesting post’s, when posted by you, but just carelessly never consider, at the time, of extending my ”Thanks”.

Please consider keeping your contributions coming as your time and energy permits.

Regards,
Tom

Chipper Q
Chipper Q
Joined: 20 Feb 05
Posts: 1540
Credit: 708571
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RE: Thanks for your

Message 16202 in response to message 16201

Quote:

Thanks for your contributions and my apologies for not responding with any gratitude this past week. I’ve read each of your interesting post’s, when posted by you, but just carelessly never consider, at the time, of extending my ”Thanks”.

Please consider keeping your contributions coming as your time and energy permits.


As fast as the discoveries happen these days, I consider myself very fortunate to be able to hear the thoughts on the science, from the scientists and fellow enthusiasts, e.g., on things like: Massive black hole spotted without a galaxy -- maybe warrants a thread of its own?

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