Astronomers Watch Star Devouring Planet

jamstar7 writes "According to Universe Today, 'Astronomers have witnessed the first evidence of a planet's destruction by its aging star as it expands into a red giant. "A similar fate may await the inner planets in our solar system, when the Sun becomes a red giant and expands all the way out to Earth's orbit some five-billion years from now," said Alex Wolszczan, from Penn State, University, who led a team which found evidence of a missing planet having been devoured by its parent star (abstract, pre-print). Wolszczan also is the discoverer of the first planet ever found outside our solar system. The planet-eating culprit, a red-giant star named BD+48 740, is older than the Sun and now has a radius about eleven times bigger than our Sun. The evidence the astronomers found was a massive planet in a surprising and highly elliptical orbit around the star — indicating a missing planet — plus the star's wacky chemical composition.' Five billion years or so is a long way off, so it's likely none of us has to worry about it. But still, watching a star eating its own planets is not only cool in its own right, but also provides food for thought as to how to keep the human species going long after the Sun starts going off the main sequence into red giant-hood. And, of course, putting more funding into astronomers' and physicists' hands now can give us a closer estimate of when it'll happen. It's all in the math..."

Comments

Red giants, the scourge of not our time.

[Anonymous Coward]

But still, watching a star eating its own planets is not only cool in its own right, but also provides food for thought as to how to keep the human species going long after the Sun starts going off the main sequence into red giant-hood.

1. Solve the fossil fuel crisis. ...
47819121. Solve for the survival of the descendants of the human species after the sun goes red giant.
47819122. Profit!

I think there's a couple steps missing.

Re:Red giants, the scourge of not our time.

[Spy Handler]

A sufficiently advanced and long-lived civilization comes to realize that its sun is a liability, not an asset.

Of course reaching the end of its life and going nova or red giant is bad. But even well before that, stars are known to throw nasty flares and Carrington-type events. And go through dim/bright cycles (almost all stars are variable to some degree, including ours).

Colonizing the moon or Mars doesn't guarantee survival of the human race. The only real way to do that is to move the planet far away from the star -- a.k.a. Fleet of Worlds. This is part of the wisdom contained in the Known Space books.

Re:Red giants, the scourge of not our time.

[geekoid]

OTOH, in a billion years we may have the technology to prolong the life of a star.

Re:Red giants, the scourge of not our time.

[thelexx]

If I have it right, humans have been around in anatomical form for about ~200,000 years. And in about one billion years, the sun will begin expansion. Let's also say that in only 500,000,000 years it will already be unlivable on Earth for the reasons you mentioned.

We would still have ~2500 'lifetimes-of-humanity-thusfar' to figure it out.

Not. Worried.

Re:Red giants, the scourge of not our time.

[K. S. Kyosuke]

Of course reaching the end of its life and going nova or red giant is bad. But even well before that, stars are known to throw nasty flares and Carrington-type events [slashdot.org]. And go through dim/bright cycles (almost all stars are variable to some degree, including ours).

Actually, even if the Sun behaves in a perfectly orderly fashion, life on Earth will be doomed long before that since the total radiative output of the Sun will gradually increase as the Sun will be moving on the H-R diagram main sequence. It could easily be unlivable here in just a few hundred million years.

Re:Red giants, the scourge of not our time.

[Anonymous Coward]

So your plan is to procrastinate for half a billion years then pull the mother of all-nighters?

pride of the human race you are.

Headline is vague

[neminem]

I would have been far more interested to know what kind of crazy planet was capable of devouring stars.

Re:Headline is vague

[SternisheFan]

I would have been far more interested to know what kind of crazy planet was capable of devouring stars.

Uh,... Uranus?

Don't Panic!

[SternisheFan]

Just grab your towel and your copy of "The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy". You DO have your copy, don't you??

Re:Don't Panic!

[ackthpt]

Just grab your towel and your copy of "The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy". You DO have your copy, don't you??

Of course I have a copy of my towel.

wait wut?

Re:Vague title

[Dupple]

The original article from Penn State is much clearer

http://science.psu.edu/news-and-events/2012-news/Wolszczan8-2012

Caught in the act?

[MDMurphy]

I guess some hyperbole comes in handy when you're trying for grants and other funding, it's definitely the norm for reporters. In the article though at least the researching team isn't quoted saying they observed it happening, but that they found evidence of it having happened. Another supposed scientist from Spain had to through in the "caught in the act" line though.

Granted something that far away will never be observed as it happened, but it's not like they observed the occurrence as it appeared here. It's like the difference between seeing the blood on the ground and a body and seeing the person being shot. One is seeing the act, one is seeing the evidence.

Re:Caught in the act?

[wonkey_monkey]

Spectra or it didn't happen.

Wait... this took seven WEEKS to hit mainstream?

[Tastecicles]

Please don't tell me it was off for peer review!?

Apart from that: Headline and TFS is sensationalist trash. No direct observation of the planet being devoured as suggested, we'll have to wait for the new L2 space telescope for even a possibility of that. All we have is an anomalous Li spectrum which **suggests**, in accordance with **currently accepted theory** of lithium propagation, that a planet **may** have just fallen into its parent star.

Re:Obligatory

[ackthpt]

I felt a great disturbance in the Force, as if millions of voices suddenly cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced. I fear something terrible has happened.

I hope Jor-El got Kal-El off in time.

Re:Wait... this took seven WEEKS to hit mainstream

[ackthpt]

Please don't tell me it was off for peer review!?

Apart from that: Headline and TFS is sensationalist trash. No direct observation of the planet being devoured as suggested, we'll have to wait for the new L2 space telescope for even a possibility of that. All we have is an anomalous Li spectrum which **suggests**, in accordance with **currently accepted theory** of lithium propagation, that a planet **may** have just fallen into its parent star.

People run for public office on even less.