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Possible Extra-Galactic Planet Detected
Nancy Atkinson writes "Using a technique called pixel-lensing, a group of astronomers in Italy may have detected a planet orbiting another star. But this planet is unique among the 300-plus exoplanets discovered so far, as it and its parent star are in another galaxy. The Andromeda Galaxy, to be exact. Technically, the star in M31 was found to have a companion about 6 times the mass of Jupiter, so it could be either a brown dwarf or a planet. But either way, this is a remarkable feat, to find an object of that size in another galaxy."
Intergalactic Planetary, Planetary Intergalactic?
https://www.eff.org/https-everywhere
Does anyone know if this pixel-lensing technique can help in finding earth-size planets in our local galaxy?
But what exactly does it tell us?
That there are planets around stars in other galaxies? Ok... has that been questioned? I mean, after all, we work under the assumption that the laws of physics are the same everywhere, so, since there are planets around our star, and planets around other stars, it shouldn't be a real surprise that there are planets around stars in other galaxies.
That we can detect them? Ok, nice to know, but what do we gain from this? I'd guess it should be easier to gain insight from local (read: In this galaxy) planets rather than trying to get any information from planets that are by some magnitudes further away.
Bottom line, is this anything but a penis comparison for astronomers who can find the farthest away planet?
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
It's science, not scouting out new planets to live on. This discovery would support the idea that planets can be found around stars in other galaxies. Specifically, it supports the Cosmological Principle, that there's nothing particularly special about our corner of the universe. It might seem like it is obvious that there are planets everywhere in the universe, but that is hardly a given. It's about removing assumptions from our models and getting down to actual facts.
I was fooled by the bad title. Surely 'extra-galactic' means outside a galaxy...I envisaged a planet just floating around in inter-galactic space which would have been really interesting. This one IS in a galaxy, just not ours.
Smivs on the intertubes!
It's a Space Station!
Donte Alistair Anderson Roberts - hi son!
Karma: Chameleon
I understand the value of searching for other planets but seriously in another galaxy? WTF? Does relavancy matter?
there's an old saw about how if we were going to find extraterrestrial life that it would have found us already. it's total bullshit because we know fuck-all about anything outside of our solar system. The more we know about what's out there the better guesses we can make, which tells us where to look for the next piece of information.
Knowing something about the rate of occurrence of planets orbiting stars in other galaxies will help us confirm or deny other theories.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
lol. Nice grumpy old man post but you forgot the "when I was young" part.
Having to work for a living is the root of all evil.
Science is done for science's sake. You would be hard pressed to find any discovery in the field of astronomy which has led to a practical discovery (I won't say there is none, because I'm sure someone can come up with an example.) Who cares about the atmosphere of Venus, or the structure of the Sun? The point is, we do science for its own sake, and when it leads to a discovery, that's nice, but hardly the goal.
You speak way too soon. Humans are Macguyvers when it comes to science. You think astronomers spot a supernova and watch it supernove just for the hell of it? They use the things to test relativity, predict temperatures, build physics theories, and attempt to determine chemical makeup and elemental behaviors in such environments and all this from something that would never seem to affect us. These studies can lead to technological and medical breakthroughs here at home. It could give us a new fusion or propulsion technology, new branches to explore in math, better lasers, who knows? I challenge you to find ANY scientific finding [read: not philosophic] that humans have had no use for within 10 years of its discovery. We use every scrap of knowledge because we, as a species, have managed to create 100 problems for every discovery that will ever be made. We were born, as a species, a sentient life on a planet without libraries. Even according to the biblical religions, we were told that "by the sweat of our brow will we eat our bread" and so we began sweating. If there's knowledge to be found in this universe from the perspective of our world, we are the ones who have to do it. So it goes.
Our thirst for knowledge, however, is overdriven by our penchance for environmental mischief, and even life-benefitting discoveries cause problems on their own. Consider healthcare. We've ballooned our ability to rehabilitate a dying human so we can practically all live 100 years, but at costs greater than we, as an entire society, can truly afford for the rising number of those who rely on this technology. Where will the solution(s) to the cost issue come from? The mathmatics of economics will help. Chemistry and Biology must also come into play, somehow, to make healthcare cheaper. Will astronomy? Its runoff understandings of chemistry, physics, and the computers we've built using the mathmatics and technology we've learned to explore the stars will all come forward. To think that the only people who make scientific discoveries are those who seek science as a hobby is naive. Discovery is almost always made in seeking the answer to a problem, a question, or a mistake. Anyone who tells you that science for science's sake is a productive is either trying to get money from you without showing results or is buying into the lottery.
I am the richest astronaut ever to win the superbowl.
Look for stuff in the Milky Way at least, we'll NEVER get there unless we figure out FTL and even finding intelligent life in another galaxy sending a message to another galaxy is so impractical that dozens of generations would pass before getting a response and then responding to that you'd pass a dozen more generations.
Space is so huge that even those who realize this are off relatively often. It would take a hundred thousand generation or 10-15 times the age of our species to get a message to M31. A dozen generations would correspond to maybe 300-400 light years, about 1 percent of the distance to the centre of our own galaxy.
On galactic scales, it's actually the closest spiral galaxy... of course, dont plan to picnic there anytime soon :)
Never antropomorphize computers, they do not like that
M31 and the Milky Way seem to be on a collision course.
From Wikipedia:
"The Andromeda Galaxy is approaching the Sun at about 300 kilometers per second (186 miles/s.), so it is one of the few blue shifted galaxies. Given the motion of the Solar System inside the Milky Way, one finds that the Andromeda Galaxy and the Milky Way are approaching one another at a speed of 100 to 140 kilometers per second (62â"87 miles/s.; 223,200â"313,200mph). The collision is predicted to occur in about 2.5 billion years. In that case the two galaxies will likely merge to form a giant elliptical galaxy.[citation needed] However, Andromeda's tangential velocity with respect to the Milky Way is only known to within about a factor of two, which creates uncertainty about the details of when the collision will take place and how it will proceed. Such events are frequent among the galaxies in galaxy groups. At least one scientist believes the collision could destroy the earth or hurl the Solar System out into inter galactic space."
Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law
I always love the irony-meter overload of someone disputing the validity of the standard model via the medium of a computer, which is composed of transistors, which rely totally on the standard model being valid. I imagine irony-meters also contain transistors.
(1.21 gigawatts) / (88 miles per hour) = 30 757 874 newtons