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Gravity-Bent Starlight Reveals a New Planet

Posted by michael on from the ICU dept.

dfab writes "The first experimental proof of Einstein's general theory has been revamped to discover planets around distant stars. Yesterday astronomers announced that a new technique called gravitational microlensing has found a star that hosts a roughly Jupiter-sized planet in a roughly Jupiter-sized orbit by observing its effect on the light from a bright star beyond that planetary system. See the NASA report or the gory details."

2 of 26 comments (clear)

  1. I can draw this stroy. Neat, huh? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    actual apparent position
    \ |
    \ |
    \ |
    \ |
    \ |
    \ |
    Big \|
    Star |
    |
    |
    earth

  2. Burnt? by Tablizer · · Score: 2, Funny

    What keeps something from focusing the light of a bright star/nova on the Earth like sun thru a magnifying glass on an ant, and cooking the whole planet? I suppose the perfect "burn" alignment would not last long enough to do large damage.

    --
    Table-ized A.I.