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First Map of an Extrasolar Planet

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on Sun May 13, 2007 07:15 AM
from the google-not-earth dept.
Space Science
jiawen writes "Data from the Spitzer Space Telescope has been used by researchers to make the first-ever map of an extrasolar planet. It's a weather map, more precisely, showing temperature variations over the surface of a Hot Jupiter. It really is hot: even the coldest regions are about 1200 degrees F."
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[+] Transit Method Reveals Many Extrasolar Planets 174 comments
eldavojohn writes "You might recall not too long ago the first photo of an extra solar planet or, more recently, the mapping & speculation on these planets that lie outside our own solar system. Long since those first few spotted in the 90s, we're now starting to find them in droves due to the popularity of a method that relies on the planet passing directly between the viewer on earth and the star that it orbits. Be sure to check out Space.com's list of the most interesting extra-solar planets. Will we ever find Earth 2.0 candidates?"
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  • on google maps?
    • ...on The Weather Channel?
      • "(Checking for press release announcing Google Space)"

        http://mars.google.com/ [google.com]

        http://moon.google.com/ [google.com]

        I really, really hope that they do add exoplanets.google.com to this list. (or even just other planets/moons within our own solar system...)

        • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

          by H3g3m0n (642800)
          Its not exactly a real map, its just a really basic heat map, having the ability to zoom in and such isn't really going to be much of an improvement over viewing the jpeg http://ipac.jpl.nasa.gov/media_images/ssc2007-09a_ medium.jpg [nasa.gov] Even if it was more than a heat map. the planet doesn't even have anything mappable, its a gas giant so its continuously changing (although maybe there would be some more permanent features like the great red spot on Jupiter). I imagine the Google landmarks for it would consis
          • Well, a temperature map is still a map =^) Jupiter.google.com, for instance, could show prevailing wind directions, approximate boundaries of bands between different atmospheric or meteorological compositions, etc. I read that the winds on that exoplanet are killer, too keep the temperature as close to evenly distributed as it is. (Haven't read TFA, but I saw a newstory about it someplace else on Friday.)

  • 1200 degrees F? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by PontifexPrimus (576159) on Sunday May 13 2007, @07:22AM (#19103181)
    So, how much is that in real temperature? Like, 35 degrees C or something?

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward
      The only real temperature is Kelvin (which admittetly is based on Celcius which makes a lot more sense than the screwed-up Fahrenheit scale imho :)
      1 200 degrees Fahrenheit = 922.038889 kelvin [google.com]
      • To be fair, the original point of F was to be a temperature scale that you could calibrate yourself, which made a lot of sense for scientific-types back before you could buy an accurately pre-calibrated thermometer in any dime store.

        The idea was that 0-degrees was ice-water (e.g. the temperature where water can exist simultaneously as a liquid and a solid. The freezing temperature of water is actually lower than this, and plain old h20-ice can get a lot colder than the freezing temperature.) and 100-degrees

        • The idea was that 0-degrees was ice-water (e.g. the temperature where water can exist simultaneously as a liquid and a solid. The freezing temperature of water is actually lower than this

          Actually the 0 was fixed as a mix of ice and salt, that also happened to be the lowest temperature observed in winter time in his region (Wikipedia [wikipedia.org] has a couple of such stories).
          0F is much lower than the freezing point of water (around 0C or +32F).

          Celsius fixed his 0 according to physical properties of water - freezing and

          • Re:1200 degrees F? (Score:5, Interesting)

            by teh kurisu (701097) on Sunday May 13 2007, @12:54PM (#19105115) Homepage

            I disagree. For weather purposes, having the freezing point of water at 0 is more useful, both because freezing temperatures make a substantial difference to human behaviour, and because it is the same worldwide. I live in what would be described as a temperate area, and temperatures here have never reached 100F and rarely dip as low as 0F, so the Fahrenheit scale is less useful.

            • the Fahrenheit scale is less useful.

              Actually, the degree of seperation between units Fahrenheit allows for greater precision, which is nice. Of course, you could just add a decimal to the celsius temp, but nobody ever does, especially the digital thermostat manufacturers.

              Anyway, I don't know what your teacher told you, but Fahrenheit and celsius are both based on -D8.
            • 0C and 32F are the same everywhere, too. A freezing point is a freezing point.

              I think what parent was trying to say is that the Fahrenheit scale offers a better range of values for people to grasp. You are less likely to need negative numbers (which leads to confusion if the negative sign is missed), and the greater separation is more intuitive for people (1 degree C is nearly 3 degrees F throughout much of the "temperate" band).

              Why, for example, should temperatures vary between 5 and 35 instead of 40 and
    • Man it's hot. It's like Africa hot. Tarzan couldn't take this kind of hot.
    • Reminds me of an old joke:

      "The interior is 50 million degrees."
      "What scale?" ...
      "Does it matter?"
    • It's hot enough that typical glass starts to ooze. Much hotter than that (1600-2000) and you reach typical hot shop temperatures where glass blowing is done.

    • So, how much is that in real temperature? Like, 35 degrees C or something?

      You know I thought the same thing (I mean this is supposed to be science reporting), but then I figured that by the time you got to 1200, it just had to be above body temperature!

    • You damn kids are ALL wrong. When I was a kid, we measured OUR degrees by the hogshead. AND WE LIKED IT!

      • Re:1200 degrees F? (Score:5, Informative)

        by Jeremy Erwin (2054) on Sunday May 13 2007, @08:20AM (#19103451) Journal
        Minimum 973 K +/- 33 K
        Maximum 1211 K +/- 11 K

        That's 1751 +/-59 R and 2171 +/-20 R, for you non SI types. Subtract 459 degrees to get Fahrenheit.
        • Tired of winter? Visit beautiful tropical HD 189733b and bask in the sun; er, star. The sunsets; er, starsets, are gorgeous!

          And the sunset; er, starset lasts all day long since one side always faces the sun; er, star.

          And at only 63 light years away in the constellation Vulpecula you can be home by dinner! Well, by dinner 120 years from now at half the speed of light (our star cruisers' speed).

          Get your ticket today! Only $9869854649868766987676786397862976279323099883836 2746333000990374623746328929928171783
  • but seriously. It orbits very close to its sun so is anyone surprised the damn thing is really hot?

    • Re:Interesting in a way i suppose (Score:5, Informative)

      by radtea (464814) on Sunday May 13 2007, @10:50AM (#19104367)
      but seriously. It orbits very close to its sun so is anyone surprised the damn thing is really hot?

      The interesting science is how the temperature is distributed, not that it is really hot. The planet is almost certainly tidally locked, so one side faces the star all the time. However, the hottest part of the planet is not at the "high noon" position on the "surface" (which for some reason is what the article calls the cloud-tops).

      The highest temperature region is about 30 degrees (angle, not temperature!) away from high noon. This, plus the relatively small temperature difference between the light hemisphere and dark hemisphere tell us that the planetary atmosphere is subject to extremely high winds, which are distributing the heat.

      This is a fascinating way of probing the dynamics of planetary atmospheres under extreme conditions.
      • The highest temperature region is about 30 degrees (angle, not temperature!) away from high noon. This, plus the relatively small temperature difference between the light hemisphere and dark hemisphere tell us that the planetary atmosphere is subject to extremely high winds, which are distributing the heat.

        Or, much more plausible, rotation is not locked on a 1:1 scale. If the relation is synchronized on some higher harmonic, like Mercury is locked on a 3:2 ratio, the hottest spot should be displaced in the

          • Tidal locking at non-unary ratios is due to eccentricity of orbit

            True, but unless there are other planets in the system, the excentricity of the orbit of a planet, particularly one with such a small orbital period as HD 189733b, will eventually disappear.

            The reason is that there is some (very) small drag in the interplanetary medium, caused by gas released by the star and the star's magnetic field, that decreases with distance. As a result of this the planet is slowed down when closest to the star. Over a

  • Amazing that this is possible at all (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Phrogman (80473) on Sunday May 13 2007, @07:26AM (#19103207) Homepage
    It doesn't seem all that long ago that scientists were merely *inferring* the presence of planets in other solar systems, now we are able to derive a map of one from IR data? Thats an amazing amount of progress for so short a time period. It would be interesting to know how far away this system is, and how large the planet is. If that data was in the article I seem to have missed it...

    • Re:Amazing that this is possible at all (Score:5, Interesting)

      by Jugalator (259273) on Sunday May 13 2007, @07:30AM (#19103231) Journal
      Yes, it's the most interesting area of space exploration now, and imagine where we'll be if the Kepler mission [wikipedia.org] is successful and don't get further pushed ahead in time by budget cuts.

    • Re:Amazing that this is possible at all (Score:5, Interesting)

      by notabaggins (1099403) on Sunday May 13 2007, @09:05AM (#19103731)
      It doesn't seem all that long ago that scientists were merely *inferring* the presence of planets in other solar systems, now we are able to derive a map of one from IR data? Thats an amazing amount of progress for so short a time period.

      More than that, it hasn't been all that long since we were debating how common extra-solar planets might be as we had no data at all. For that matter, it's been all of 77 years since the discovery of Pluto, roughly the range of a human lifespan.

      Maybe it's me but, some days, you just have to sit back and think... wow...

    • Once the square kilometer array has been constructed, we will be able to get maps of this level of detail on Earth-sized planets at 1 AU from its sun at distances of around 50 light-years or so. If they made it a square mile, they could do the same at a distance of 100 light-years.

      Oh, one small correction. We'd be able to get continuous maps. In other words, you'd be able to see temperature (and atmosphere composition) changes over time.

      (At that point, something like SETI would get potentially much less of an intragalactic lottery and be much more interesting.)

      I honestly don't know what resolution the NASA folks are working at, but the image presented is almost certainly some form of interpolation from available data, as even a super-Jovian planet is far too small to get more than a pixel or two resolution at any distance. I don't quite know what they're calculating, rather than directly observing, but there is simply no way they're getting that kind of resolution with direct measurement. Not of a planet.

      There's nothing wrong with mathematical techniques, and if they're as good as they seem to be, then obviously the square kilometer array will be able to resolve Earth-sized planets at greater resolution than initially expected. Which is good, so long as the methods applied are valid.

      (Let's face it - if anyone quibbles with these results, who do you think NASA would send over there to personally check? The person getting fame and glory for the organisation, or the person who is spoiling the party?)

      • (At that point, something like SETI would get potentially much less of an intragalactic lottery and be much more interesting.)

        Just don't tell anybody this is SETI (common noun) before the funding gets approved. The sibling-rivalry about ETI is insane.

  • Get the paper here (Score:5, Informative)

    by Ambitwistor (1041236) on Sunday May 13 2007, @07:40AM (#19103277)
    You can read a preprint [arxiv.org] of the published paper for free. (The published version is here [nature.com], but full text access requires a Nature subscription.)
  • The warmest spot is 927 C, on the equivalent of Jupiter's Great Red Spot, and the coolest region is 'only' 649 C.

  • Data from the Spitzer Space Telescope has been used by researchers to make the first-ever map of an extrasolar planet
    Data's really keeping himself busy these days.

  • A Matter of Time... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by SeaDour (704727) on Sunday May 13 2007, @08:25AM (#19103483) Homepage
    Seems it's only a matter of time now before we can image a planet with pretty city lights on the dark side.
  • Eheheheeh, yea, that is as said, fantastic for an exclamation - Hot Jupiters !!!

  • Hot Jupiters! (Score:3, Funny)

    by Progman3K (515744) on Sunday May 13 2007, @10:16AM (#19104171)
    That's amazing, batman!
  • Looking at the map it seems like the polar regions are the coolest. If that is so and the planet is tidal locked shouldn't the far side be cooler ?

    • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

      by cathector (972646)
      the article posits that the far side is still pretty hot for the same reason the big Hot Spot is not exactly facing the star: 6000 MPH (9656 KPH) winds are pushing everything around.

      I'm not clear from the articles if by "coolest spot" they mean the coolest spot on the equator, or they're including the poles.
  • How long before Al Gore makes a movie about it? :D
  • Okay, after taking a look at the article, the press release, and the associated images, I have a question about the pattern of recorded temperature on the surface of the planet. If the hot spot on the planet is offset by 30 degrees of the substellar (high noon) point because of a predicted 6,000 mph jetstream to the east, why then does the coolest equatorial temperature show up directly to the east of the hot spot? In other words, why doesn't the long orange tail of mid-temperatures extend to the east of th

    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward
      IF you had bothered to RTFA, you'd have known that the side nearest the star isn't quite the hottest. The hotspot is offset slightly; the theory being that there's a very strong circulation of atmosphere going on.

      The wonder isn't that they've found out that one side is hotter than the other, as per your snide comment, but that they can estimate the temperatures of both sides closely, and even locate where the hottest spot is, and do it over interstellar distances. I think that's worth the "kajillion" dollar
    • No they used it to decern from the data available that the hottest area does not make sence unless the surface of the planet has increadibly high winds, or some other force.

      You know, like what scientsits like to do.

    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      by rbanffy (584143)
      No.

      But Venus is a nice example of a runaway greenhouse effect on a rocky planet. When people predict a stable ice age because of increased polar melting, I am forced to show there are at least two stable states for a planet like ours and I prefer the ice-age one over the other.

      And since we have been in and out ice ages for... ages, the other state seems much more stable.

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