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Related: About this forumCitizen Planet Hunters Find a Planet in a Four-Star System
A planet has been discovered orbiting in a four-star system and no, that doesnt mean the accommodations and conditions are excellent. It literally means four stars, where a planet is orbiting a binary star system that in turn is orbited by a second distant pair of stars. This is the first system like this that has ever been found, and its discovery demonstrates the power of citizen scientists, as it was found by joint effort of amateurs participating on the Planet Hunters website under the guidance of professional astronomers.
This is might be an extremely rare planetary setup, astronomer Meg Schwamb from Yale says, as only six planets are currently known to orbit two stars, and none of these are orbited by other stellar companions. Astronomers are calling the newly found world a circumbinary planet.
Circumbinary planets are the extremes of planet formation, said Schwamb, Planet Hunters scientist and lead author of a paper about the system presented Oct. 15 at the annual meeting of the Division for Planetary Sciences of the American Astronomical Society in Reno, Nevada. The discovery of these systems is forcing us to go back to the drawing board to understand how such planets can assemble and evolve in these dynamically challenging environments.
The planet is called PH1, for the first confirmed planet identified by the Planet Hunters citizen scientists, but it has the nickname of Tatooine, the planet in Star Wars that orbited two suns.
Read more: http://www.universetoday.com/97999/citizen-planet-hunters-find-planet-in-a-four-star-system/
Autumn Colors
(2,379 posts)"... but it has the nickname of Tatooine, the planet in Star Wars that orbited two suns. "
Foolacious
(497 posts)This is the second article in the last few days to describe an extrasolar planet as dense, and then provide enough dimensions about the planet to reveal that it's of the same or less density than Earth. In this story, the "dense" planet has 6.2 times Earth's diameter, and a mass of 170 times Earth's. That gives it a density of about 70% of Earth's. If I'd written the article I'd have clarified that the planet is dense for a gas giant.
eppur_se_muova
(36,289 posts)Judi Lynn
(160,621 posts)Astronomers discover planet with four suns
Agence France-Presse | Updated: October 16, 2012 12:26 IST
Washington: An international team of amateur and professional astronomers has discovered a planet whose skies are lit up by four suns -- the first known case of such a phenomenon.
The planet, located about 5,000 light years from Earth, has been dubbed PH1 in honor of Planet Hunters, a programme led by Yale University in the United States, which enlists volunteers to look for signs of new planets.
PH1 is orbiting two suns, and in turn is orbited by a second distant pair of stars. Only six planets are known to orbit two stars, researchers say, and none of those are orbited by other distant stars.
"Circumbinary planets are the extremes of planet formation," said Yale's Meg Schwamb, lead author of a paper presented on Monday at the annual meeting of the Division for Planetary Sciences of the American Astronomical Society in Nevada.
More:
http://www.ndtv.com/article/world/280326