Why Were Hot Jupiters Initially Puzzling To Astronomers? Giant alien planets known as “hot Jupiters” orbit their stars much closer than Mercury does the sun. But the mystery of the origins of hot Jupiters deepened when astronomers recently discovered the scorching orbits of these worlds are often bizarrely skewed, tilted when compared with the equators
Will We Ever Be Able To See Exoplanets? Right now, it’s impossible. From our vantage point, exoplanets—planets orbiting other stars—look like fireflies next to spotlights. In the few images we’ve managed to take of them, the exoplanets are mere dots. How long would it take to get to the closest exoplanet? Velocities that are currently
Are Extrasolar Planets Rare? It’s pretty rare for astronomers to see an exoplanet through their telescopes the way you might see Saturn through a telescope from Earth. That’s called direct imaging, and only a handful of exoplanets have been found this way (and these tend to be young gas giant planets orbiting very far from
Why Is Our Jupiter Not A Hot Jupiter? Jupiter, rather than continuing its migration to within a few million miles of the Sun as a Hot Jupiter would have done, instead changed course: it tacked. As Jupiter got to within 1.5 AU of the sun, about where Mars is now, it’s forward migration halted and
Does Kepler Have Planets? While our own inner solar system has four planets, Kepler found systems with considerably more planets — up to eight — orbiting close to their parent stars. What is the gravity on Kepler 186f? If the exoplanet were “rocky” like Earth (made up of one-third iron and two-thirds silicate rock, water
Why Is The Hubble Space Telescope So Special? Hubble’s incredible reach — made possible by the fact that its sight was not impaired by the Earth’s atmosphere — allowed astronomers to get closer looks at space phenomena like never before, watching stars and planets as they form, examining exoplanets and capturing the power of cosmic
How Long Does Ceres Take To Orbit The Sun? Orbit and Rotation Ceres takes 1,682 Earth days, or 4.6 Earth years, to make one trip around the Sun. As Ceres orbits the Sun, it completes one rotation every 9 hours, making its day length one of the shortest in the solar system. How fast does
How Many Planets Are There In Other Galaxies? NASA estimates that there are at least 100 billion planets in our Milky Way alone. Others estimated that the Milky Way galaxy might have anywhere between 100 to 200 billion planets. Currently, over 4,000 exoplanets have been discovered, and every day, more and more follow. Do other
How Many Extrasolar Planets Are There? To date, more than 4,000 exoplanets have been discovered and are considered “confirmed.” However, there are thousands of other “candidate” exoplanet detections that require further observations in order to say for sure whether or not the exoplanet is real. Are extrasolar planets rare? It’s pretty rare for astronomers to
Which Of The Following Is Thought To Explain Many Of The Exceptions To The Rules Of Our Solar System? Which of the following is thought to explain many of the “exceptions to the rules” of our solar system? … There are clear patterns to the rotation and orbits of large bodies in the solar system.