4-inch Telescope Finds New Planet 253
serutan writes "After a backyard astronomy size telescope first tracked the periodic dimming of a star 500 light-years away, the Keck I telescope in Hawaii later confirmed that a Jupiter-size planet orbits the star. A press release from Harvard gives details. This is the first result of the Trans-Atlantic Exoplanet Survey, a project using small telescopes and cheap equipment to search for extrasolar planets. "
Proof that size doesn't matter (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Proof that size doesn't matter (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Proof that size doesn't matter (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Proof that size doesn't matter (Score:2)
Re:Proof that size doesn't matter (Score:5, Informative)
There should be lots of resources on the web on how to make your own telescope.
Re:Proof that size doesn't matter (Score:2)
When I read this, why is it that I am reminded of a line from Blazing Saddles [imdb.com]: "Excuse me while a whip this out."?
In Related News... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:In Related News... (Score:5, Funny)
But does this new neighbor have Jupiter-sized orbs?
Re:In Related News... (Score:2, Funny)
They're pulling me in. Can't. . . resist. .
KFG
Smaller Planets? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Smaller Planets? (Score:5, Informative)
also, jovian planets are good info too. One strong hypothesis is that life couldnt exist on earth without a big planet (jupiter) out there sweeping up most of the space junk (asteroids, comets, etc) that comes falling into the solar system. Big planets help out the inner planets by keeping collisions down.
Re:Smaller Planets? (Score:5, Funny)
Think of Jovian planets as switches, routers and other Layer-2 and above network hardware. They break up collision domains.
Ha...
(funny to me ok!)
Re:Smaller Planets? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Smaller Planets? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Smaller Planets? (Score:2)
Yes, but this particular system is likely not to have any earthy planets as its gas giant is near the center of its gravity well. Thus, this planet helps suck in space junk.
Re:Smaller Planets? (Score:2)
Re:Smaller Planets? (Score:2)
Re:Smaller Planets? (Score:2)
Well, as the gas gets thinner, the sonic frequencies go up leaving less in the bass range. There just might be something to your idea.
Re:Smaller Planets? (Score:5, Informative)
Now, as for something having to pass through Jupiter's orbit at just the right time, you're right -- its a big solar system. But the junk flying around doesnt fly very fast....and its not likely to hit anything. It's most likely to hit either the sun, or Jupiter, and thats the key. without the gas giants, all that junk is mostly likely to hit...earth.
Of course, stuff still does (ask the dinosaurs or the trilobytes) but at a low enough rate, and its small enough, that life can handle it.
Re:Smaller Planets? (Score:5, Informative)
Will this method help find smaller planets?
Almost certainly not. The amplitude of the brightness variations, caused by the transit of a terrestrial planet, varies as the square of the ratio between the radius of the star and the planet. For the Sun/Earth values, this figure comes out as a 0.008% variation in brightness, or -- in astronomical terms -- a change of 0.2 millimagnitudes.
Measuring such small changes is extremely difficult, even using very large (5-10m) ground-based telescopes that have fancy optics and a high throughput. That's why terrestrial planet finding using the transit method will have to wait for NASA's Kepler mission [nasa.gov]. Scheduled for launch in 2007, this mission will look for minute brightness variations in c. 100,000 nearby Solar-type stars.
Re:Smaller Planets? (Score:2)
Re:Smaller Planets? (Score:4, Interesting)
I doubt it. Terrestrial planets wouldn't block enough of a star's light to make a noticable difference. Consider that the Earth is about 8,000 miles in diameter and Sol about 865,000. That's roughly 108 times the diameter and the area (what's important here) is proportional to the square of the diameter making Sol's area on the order of 11664 times that of the Earth. Even with Jovian planets, the area covered is small, but apparently not too small.
Re:Smaller Planets? (Score:2, Interesting)
Even if we are belting out radio waves using every milliamp of power we possess, they are simply drowned out by the enormous radio source we orbit.
Thats why in the larger scheme of things, only something as large as a supernova could be used to contact other star systems, and even then, we could only ping them, then get 100% packet loss.
Re:Smaller Planets? (Score:2, Insightful)
Not really. From everything I've ever read, it's said that we emit as much radio activity as a small star.
That, along with the fact that our radio "noise" isn't random, should help us stand out rather well, I'd think.
Cosmic Thrill Seeker? (Score:4, Informative)
All well and good? You gotta be kidding me! Someone with a hobby telescope spots something like this and it's like a hole-in-one in golf. Maybe you're looking for your next home, but at this stage even the people with the big radio scopes are excited by a planet find.
Maybe when we are able to warp space or whatever we'll get close enough to most of these stars to find something puny like an Earth size planet. For the meantime keep in mind the only way we know these things are there is from observation of the stars they orbit -- at this distance an Earth or Mars would be very hard to detect.
Re:Smaller Planets? (Score:2)
Neato (Score:3, Informative)
Err, wait, never mind. Just read the Harvard press release and the "It took several Ph.D. scientists working full-time to develop the data analysis methods for this search program," bit.
Cool.
Re:Neato (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Neato (Score:2, Funny)
prof1: Twinkle, twinkle little star, how I wonder what you are.
prof2: Up above the world so high, like a diamond in the sky.
prof1: Twinkle, twinkle little star, how I wonder what you are.
Detected dimming? (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Detected dimming? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Detected dimming? (Score:4, Informative)
All stars "dim" or twinkle to a regular viewer, due to our atomsphere. If it were just atmospheric stuff, the dimming cycle should be pretty much random. But software can find a pattern in the "dimming" that a human couldnt. (The "cycle" would last months, if not years, would it not)
2 decades ago this software didn't exist.
Re:Detected dimming? (Score:2)
Re:Detected dimming? (Score:4, Informative)
What matters is the quantity of light recieved per unit time. With the proper equipment on the end, even a small telescope can accurately measure very precisely the amount of light it recieves. I imagine the tricky part is eliminating other factors such as local environmental conditions.
Re:Detected dimming? (Score:5, Informative)
Unfortunately this is not so.
The angular size of a star is much smaller than the angular size of (say) the Andromeda Galaxy, which probably makes up a majority of the non-Milky Way pictures of galaxies that most people see.
A star is usually tens to hundreds of thousands of km across. There are a few exceptions, but for the most part this is true. A galaxy is tens to hundreds of thousands of light years across. That's about 10000000000000 times larger. However, a galaxy like Andromeda is less than a 100000 times more distant than they stars we're talking about. Therefore, we can see significant internal detail.
That's great and all... (Score:3, Funny)
Re:That's great and all... (Score:4, Funny)
Good to see you are using that time wisely.
Not the telescope (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Not the telescope (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Not the telescope (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Not the telescope (Score:2)
Re:Not the telescope (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Not the telescope (Score:2)
Imagine a Beowolf...
Re:Not the telescope (Score:3, Funny)
Kudos (Score:2)
Re:Kudos (Score:5, Funny)
Boy am I glad you ended that sentence with the word 'telescope'.
Re:Kudos (Score:2)
-aiabx
Or.. (Score:5, Interesting)
Here =======} * [space.com]
Re:Or.. (Score:3, Interesting)
Very close (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Very close (Score:5, Interesting)
The hydrogen would only be captured by the star if the gravity of the planet was too weak to hold the hydrogen, or the gravity at the planet's "surface" or whatnot was weaker than the gravity exerted at that surface by the star. Which is rather unlikely...sure its real close to the star but its a real big planet too.
Re:Very close (Score:2)
Re:Very close (Score:2)
Re:Very close (Score:2)
Re:Very close (Score:2, Funny)
Eat a bowl of chili and let us know.
Re:Very close (Score:2)
Re:Very close (Score:2)
Well, assuming a mass of around that of Sol (2E30), at a distance of 4 million miles, I get an acceleration due to the star's gravity of around 3m/(s*s).
(Hey, slashdot, how come no sup tag?)
That's from g = GM/(r*r), and converting r to metres.
Re:Very close (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Very close (Score:2)
Name? (Score:5, Funny)
Different alternative to existing telescopes. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Different alternative to existing telescopes. (Score:2)
Re:Different alternative to existing telescopes. (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Different alternative to existing telescopes. (Score:2, Interesting)
Question, (Score:3, Interesting)
I am SO guessing on this, but there can't be that many super smart astronomer types out there and it may be a waste to have them on less than awesome machines. Can a non-moron, non-specialist handle the datagathering and analysis with this package? I'm mostly just curious about this.
Another planet announcement today... (Score:5, Informative)
Although it is Uranus-sized, it is close to the star, and so it may not be similar.
ESO press release: http://www.eso.org/outreach/press-rel/pr-2004/pr-2 2-04.html [eso.org]
Re:Another planet announcement today... (Score:2)
C'mon... Wake up and think!
Confusing Units (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Confusing Units (Score:5, Funny)
The classic 1974 VW Beetle had a mass of 870 kg.
So a Jupiter-sized planet is about 2183908045977011494252873 VW Beetles.
I was unable to find the mass of the LOC. Sorry.
Simple (Score:5, Funny)
I hope this helps. :-)
Amateur Astronomy (Score:5, Informative)
Who's gonna go get a scope now? I suggested Orion Scopes [telescope.com] for price vs bells and whistles (if you are into the extra gadgetry and have the paycheck to not care about price, go Meade).
Re:Amateur Astronomy (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Amateur Astronomy (Score:2, Insightful)
I sincerely am not trying to be a jerk, and this isn't flamebait, but really: Who cares? There are millions, billions, or trillions of planets out there - and this means what exactly? We can't even reliably support missions to a little rock a stone throw away, much less set up a colony. Visiting the nearest star is, pardon the pun, astronomically more difficult.
Don't get me wrong: I believe in practical astronomy. Research such as ens
Re:Amateur Astronomy (Score:4, Interesting)
This isnt, as the slashdot blurb suggests, some weekend warrior on his back porch who discovered a new planet.
Re:Amateur Astronomy (Score:3, Interesting)
Some NASA dude (Score:4, Interesting)
I am not really into astronomy, but I wonder if one of those guys found it..
Once again (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Once again (Score:4, Insightful)
-aiabx
4 inches - slightly misleading (Score:2, Funny)
I was thinking this might also be a story on nanotechnology... a 4" long telescope.
oh well, back to work.
So much for Big Science (Score:5, Insightful)
There needs to be a lot more prizes awarded to amateur scientists for discoveries and fewer big science projects.
Re:So much for Big Science (Score:2, Funny)
Re:So much for Big Science (Score:3, Insightful)
Gimme a break. Why pit one type of science vs. another? Why not just say all science and all scientific discoveries are great and are great for all of science?
Re:So much for Big Science (Score:4, Insightful)
They could have gotten away with a 3-meter like at Lick Observatory, in this case, given the large radial velocity amplitude, but for further-out planets Keck is the only way to go. Trying to do this part of the science with more 10 cm telescopes would be out of the question.
Last time.... (Score:3, Funny)
-psy
Re:Last time.... (Score:2)
Hmmm (Score:5, Interesting)
Again?
Am I the only one beginning to feel a little skepticism about some of these claims? They keep finding giant planets closer to stars than Mercury, which seems to fly in the face of many previously established theories of planetary system formation.
Yeah, maybe this is new info that modifies the older theories, and maybe this is the way things are but something just seems wrong here. They keep finding this situation of Jupiter sized (or larger) worlds hugging their parent stars. Could there be some other mechanism at work?
One other idea is that this is simply the sitation we are able to detect with current methods (dimming and wobble), but, geez, there's so many of them like this. My Spidey-sense has begun to tingle.
Re:Hmmm (Score:5, Informative)
I think it's mostly down to the fact that these large planets close to their parent stars are easier to see.
If you're looking at a Jupiter-sized object that orbits closer than Mercury, then you're going to have an orbital period on the order of days or weeks. On the other hand, if you want to detect a Jupiter-sized object orbiting at that same distance Jupiter does from our Sun, then your orbital period ends up as years or tens of years (Jupiter completes one orbit in a bit less than twelve years.)
Depending on the technique you use to detect a planet, you often need to show a pattern that persists through at least two or three consecutive orbits.
In the case discussed here, very small changes in brightness (less than 1%) were observed every time there was a transit (the planet passed between us and the other star); these events took place every three days. In principle, one could get sufficient data in a week or so. If we were looking at an object with an orbit like Jupiter's, we'd need to have at least a quarter century of careful monitoring of the star. Other techniques also require significantly more data collection time or more sensitive equipment as the planets get smaller and their orbits grow longer. The reason why we're detecting massive gas giants in close orbits is because they're the easiest planets to see. We're definitely not getting a random sample of all planets.
Yes, the planets we are seeing seem unusual, but they're still quite few in absolute number. Perhaps in twenty years when we can reliably start detecting rocky, Earth-type planets in Earth-type orbits we'll be able to make more definitive statements. Right now we're like biologists trying to understand human life--but only being allowed to study specimens weighing more than 600 lbs.
Re:Hmmm (Score:3, Informative)
Just because it's orbiting there now doesn't mean it had to have formed there. There are some theories of our own Solar System which place Jupiter in a much closer orbit billions of years ago, but it slowly migrated outward through interactions with other solar system bodies.
Re:Hmmm (Score:3, Insightful)
Or perhaps there is more than one method of planetary formation. Let's face facts, even most knowledgeable people on this subject are still pretty much novices. We haven't even seen one of these planets yet, it's all one big theory that will be modified over and over again. If the theory of the planet size and speed based on wobble, dimming, etc is correct in its current form than t
Re:Hmmm (Score:4, Informative)
SETI for telescopes? (Score:2)
I am more intrigued by the speed... (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:I am more intrigued by the speed... (Score:3, Interesting)
Where R is orbital radius, G is gravitational constant, T is orbital period.
Plugging into Google gives a mass for the star of 2.3*10^30 [google.com] kilograms. Almost exactly equal to our sun's mass.
(Offtopic note -- I love Google calculator. It normalizes all units to SI automagically!)
A ground based telescope... (Score:3, Interesting)
Adaptive Optics correct for Atmospheric distortion (Score:5, Informative)
But... remember Reagan's "Star Wars" space defense progam? One of the very few useful things we got for all that money was a technology called "adaptive optics." Basically, technology that takes the "twinkle" and the "wobble" out of stars.
Just about everything optical (and maybe even infrared) on Mauna Kea has some AO ability nowadays, using tertiary mirrors that can be adjusted ("tip-tilt") or deformed many times per second by computer-controlled actuators, and/or Orthogonal Transfer CCD's [photonics.com] co-developed by University of Hawaii and MIT.
I work a few nights a month on Mauna Kea, and have seen an OTCCD instrument (OPTIC) in use on UH's 88-inch telescope (which also has a simple tip-tilt system available, I think), and it's pretty neat technology. I'm hoping the technology will lead to better image-stabilization technology for photography and videography... and I'd also like to see it "trickle down" to amateur telescopes. :)
Angry Mob Says. . . (Score:2, Funny)
Size/quality (Score:5, Informative)
You can buy scopes better than that! (Score:3, Informative)
This assumes that you consider $3,500 to be an "amateur" telescope. Serious amateur, yes. Note, to get serious about high quality imaging you need to spend at
Kepler probe will watch 100,000 stars in 2007 (Score:5, Informative)
Re:4-inch-telescopre ain't much, but... (Score:3, Insightful)
Perhaps you joke, but maybe it could be done.
There are a lot of small telescopes out there on computerised mounts. You just dial in an object and it will automatically go to and track that object.
Right, now manufacture a few hundred lightmeters with flash memory and USB connections. Advertise for amateur astronomers with GoTo telescopes to participate in this research programme. They go out each night and set their tele