Aftermath of Distant Planetary Collision?

gazurtoid writes "Astrobiology Magazine is reporting that astronomers have announced a mystery object orbiting the 8-million-year-old brown dwarf 2M1207 170 light-years from Earth might have formed from the collision and merger of two protoplanets. The object, known as 2M1207B, has puzzled astronomers since its discovery because it seems to fall outside the spectrum of physical possibility. Its combination of temperature, luminosity, and age do not match up with any theory. 'Hot, post-collision planets might be a whole new class of objects we will see with the Giant Magellan Telescope', said Eric Mamajek of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics."

Comments

Old Earth

[usul294]

Maybe these planets are similar to Earth after the collision that resulted in the Moon. If so it would be incredibly useful for learning about the formation of the Earth and the Moon. as well as our geologic history.

Re:Old Earth

[Daniel Dvorkin]

Sounds like what they're talking about here is a gas giant formed by the collision of two smaller gas giants, so it wouldn't shed much light on the history of Earth and the Moon directly.

Re:Old Earth

[Junior J. Junior III]

I've been modeling the physics for this using an old lava lamp and a Cray 1 supercomputer. It's strangely compelling.

Re:Old Earth

[Anonymous Coward]

Earth after the collision that resulted in the Moon That hypothesis has been challenged.

http://metaresearch.org/solar%20system/origins/original-solar-system.asp

IMO, solar fission is a better theory than dust accretion, where "better" is defined as:

1. Provides genuine insight.
2. Does not contradict existing data.
3. Makes predictions that, if falsified, would disprove the hypothesis.

Short version: in order for a collision to produce a moon in a stable orbit, the impacting body must fall into a very narrow range of mass, velocity, and impact angles. This could have happened for one or two moons, but there are simply too many in the solar system to have all formed in this way. Furthermore, there is little evidence of all the failed attempts that must have also occurred. It is far more likely for candidate collisions to simply do damage, scatter some mass perhaps, or even shatter the unlucky planet.

Solar fission hypothesizes that planets are a necessary consequence of stellar evolution, and moons are a necessary consequence of planetary formation. As they age, heavier elements build up in their cores, causing a spinup - like a figure skater tucking their arms in. At first the parent body would swell at its equator, due to gravity being partially cancelled by centripetal force. Eventually the surface velocity exceeds escape velocity, and a chunk of matter is thrown. Stars and gas giants would throw chunks in pairs, one from each side, whereas rocky planets such as Earth and Venus would only create one moon at a time, since the planet would spin down before the second chunk can breach the crust.

Poke fun all you want. The physics are valid.

Cheers.

Re:Old Earth

[Your.Master]

> ...it wouldn't shed much light on the history of Earth and the Moon directly.

Well yeah, that's the problem.

FTA: "Given its temperature, astronomers would expect a certain luminosity for 2M1207B, but it is 10 times fainter than expected."

Species 2M1207B...

[MacarooMac]

Sounds like Borg Cube to me.

Perhaps they'll get me the hell outa here. I start dual booting Vista and linux to hedge my compatibility bets.

OT, but... AstroBIOLOGY Magazine?

[PornMaster]

Is Astrobiology Magazine slumming with the astrophysicists while waiting for someone to find life outside of Earth's biosphere?

Re:How to beat the Borg

[techno-vampire]

If you really want to beat the Borg, send in the Vogons!

af
"Resistance is futile!"

"No! Resistance is USELESS!"

Lather, rinse, repeat ad nauseum.

Re:"Plasma Universe" busted, by its own criteria?

[APODNereid]

Actually, Michael Mozina has been performing an in-depth review of magnetic reconnection Is this, perchance, the same Michael Mozina who posted to this Einstein@Home thread (in the Science Message Board)?
[How the Sun shines: http://einstein.phys.uwm.edu/forum_thread.php?id=6058]

The guy who is co-author of a paper which claims the Sun was formed when a super-massive neutron star fragmented into smaller pieces, and one such fragment became a ~0.1 sol neutron star core of the Sun*?

The same one who has been particularly vehement, in many internet discussion fora, that a) the concept of 'neutron stars' violates his fundamental rule of science (that every theory must be tested, empirically, in controlled conditions, in earthly labs^), and b) the Sun has a solid (mostly iron?) surface?

The same one who is a co-author of a paper claiming that the Sun is powered (~67%) by the decay of excited neutrons in its core and (~34%) by standard fission reactions*? Yet who is also on record, in many fora, as claiming that "the bulk of the total energy release of the sun comes from an external energy source (flowing electrons)"?

The same one who claims that the mass of the Sun is under-estimated because the solar system is accelerating in the z-direction (or something like this)? That the 'missing matter' in galaxies is largely due to stars being more massive than estimated because they are composed largely of iron?

If so, then I wonder if you can ask him from which university he got his PhD in plasma physics? In which laboratories has he done plasma science experiments?

And when does he plan to publish a paper, based on his review, in a relevant IEEE journal (the one Peratt is editor of perhaps)?

Oh, and how many equations are presented in the laying out of his arguments?

* This idea resembles nothing like any 'Electric Universe' idea I've ever come across, nor do the papers he is a co-author of reference Birkeland, Alfvén, currents, Peratt, Thornhill, ... (at least, not that I remember). Maybe it's a different Michael Mozina.

^ You can find many lots of instances of him insisting that 'a gram' of something be produced in a lab before that something can be said to have been 'scientifically qualified'. Curiously, he has continued to say this long after the paper he co-authored went up on the arXiv preprint server.