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'Einstein's Planet' Becomes First Exoplanet Discovered Using New Method

Posted by Soulskill on from the crazy-hair-mandatory-on-einstein's-planet dept.

cylonlover writes "Due to their relative faintness compared to their parent stars, most known exoplanets have been discovered using indirect detection methods – that is, detecting the effects they have rather than observing them directly. There are numerous indirect methods that have proven useful in the detection of exoplanets and now yet another, which relies on Einstein's special theory of relativity (abstract), has joined the list with the discovery of an exoplanet known as Kepler-76b."

22 of 81 comments (clear)

  1. How many of these planets are habitable? by bejiitas_wrath · · Score: 2, Interesting

    How many of these planets are in the goldilocks zone? Sure we can find them; but which ones are livable for Carbon based lifeforms?

    --
    liberare massarum ex ignorantia, clausa descendit molestie.
    1. Re:How many of these planets are habitable? by TwentyCharsIsNotEnou · · Score: 3, Insightful

      We don't know. But it's still worth detecting them.

      Should we stop looking for planets until we have the capability to get satellite imagery of the cities on them?

    2. Re:How many of these planets are habitable? by Takatata · · Score: 2

      So, we will need it. Very funny. What do you intend to do, when we find one? Buy a bus ticket?

    3. Re:How many of these planets are habitable? by buchner.johannes · · Score: 5, Informative

      There are some numbers in this newest comic: http://www.phdcomics.com/comics/archive.php?comicid=1584

      --
      NB: The message above might reflect my opinion right now, but not necessarily tomorrow or next year.
    4. Re:How many of these planets are habitable? by niftydude · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I did not say we should stop looking; but it would be nice to find Earth 2. We will need it eventually.

      Find Earth 2? Pfft, I'd rather make Earth 2. Anyone want to give me some funding to get some terraforming going on?

      --
      You can never know everything, and part of what you do know will always be wrong. Perhaps even the most important part.
    5. Re:How many of these planets are habitable? by jbeaupre · · Score: 4, Funny

      Billions and billions*.

      * assuming one per galaxy.

      --
      The world is made by those who show up for the job.
    6. Re:How many of these planets are habitable? by Cenan · · Score: 5, Insightful

      A planet doesn't need to be in the Goldilocks zone to be habitable, it's just the safest bet we have for estimating habitability. It's dangerous to exclude planets that are too big, too far out or in general unlike Earth. Moons around gaseous giants might very well be just as habitable as Earth is, but for a different reason than being close to a star. All that is really needed is enough energy to keep water liquid, which could be had via volcanism or gravitational pressure from a larger neighbor.

      --
      ... whatever ...
    7. Re:How many of these planets are habitable? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Depends on how long you are willing to travel, and the bust stops you have in the mean time. Eventually, your descendants will reach it. Or not. Either way it is worth trying... When time comes.

    8. Re:How many of these planets are habitable? by tbird81 · · Score: 4, Informative

      From the article:
      "Einstein's planet," formally known as Kepler-76b, is a "hot Jupiter" that orbits its star every 1.5 days. Its diameter is about 25 percent larger than Jupiter and it weighs twice as much. It orbits a type F star located about 2,000 light-years from Earth in the constellation Cygnus.

      The planet is tidally locked to its star, always showing the same face to it, just as the Moon is tidally locked to Earth. As a result, Kepler-76b broils at a temperature of about 2000 Kelvin.

    9. Re:How many of these planets are habitable? by mbone · · Score: 3, Informative

      How many of these planets are in the goldilocks zone? Sure we can find them; but which ones are livable for Carbon based lifeforms?

      According to the catalog, 10 (out of 885) are confirmed so far. From the catalog, "Gliese 581d, Kepler-22b, Gliese 667Cc, Gliese 581g, Gliese 163c, HD 40307g, Tau Cetie, Kepler-62e, Kepler-62f, and Kepler-61b are the only known exoplanets that might be considered potentially habitable or object of interest for the search for life.

      There are a further 18 (out of 2716) unconfirmed Kepler candidates that (if they are not false positives) also may reside in their habitable zones. These should be confirmed (or rejected) in due course. Of course, "potentially habitable" does not mean you want to start considering a new vacation home. If Venus and Mars were reversed (i.e., Venus was in Mars's orbit, and Mars in Venus's), each would probably be nicely habitable. As they are, not so much, at least, not without a considerable amount of planetary engineering.

    10. Re:How many of these planets are habitable? by gstoddart · · Score: 4, Informative

      Given that our current understanding is that the universe has no end, is infinite, then the number of any type of planet you could imagine would be infinite.

      I'm not sure it's understood to be truly 'infinite', but 'so damned big as to be infinite for purposes of discussion'.

      And there was a time (not even all that long ago) when it was thought that planets around other stars would be very rare and uncommon.

      In university I hung out with a bunch of astrophysicists, and the idea of finding exoplanets was still something we weren't sure of, and it was assumed there was a relatively small number of stars which would have planets.

      It's only just over 20 years since we confirmed the first one, and in that time the rate at which we detect them keeps going up at a pretty staggering rate. To the point now that if you look at Drake's equation, it's hard not to conclude that, somewhere, some form of life has probably evolved elsewhere in the universe, and probably even intelligent life existed at some point.

      Admittedly, the distances and time spans are so vast as to make it highly unlikely we'd ever find them. But, to me at least, it just seems so improbable that we're the only life to have evolved anywhere in the entire universe.

      --
      Lost at C:>. Found at C.
    11. Re:How many of these planets are habitable? by Takatata · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Do you really know what you are talking about? Building generation ships, which are big enough to have a large enough population to build a genetically stable society? For a travel, which takes several thousand years? 100% self-contained for such a long time? To a planet, from which we get information, which are several thousand years old? Oh, I am sure there would be many who would sign for such a ride. Might be even fun for a while, but don't expect that any descendant ever reaches such a planet alive. But hey, the way is the goal.

    12. Re:How many of these planets are habitable? by InvalidError · · Score: 2

      I'm not sure it's understood to be truly 'infinite', but 'so damned big as to be infinite for purposes of discussion'.

      In terms of boundaries, it probably is... but maybe someday radio-telescopes will discover something from beyond the cosmic background radiation that will reveal that our universe is not what we thought it was. Maybe we will discover that our universe is just some kid's world-in-a-jar science project in a higher-order universe or something.

      In terms of mass, the Big Bang Theory does imply that the universe has finite mass, however unimaginable it may be at least with our current understanding of matter and the universe.

      An equally interesting theory that goes with the BBT is the Big Crunch: will the outward kinetic energy from the Big Bang propel galaxies so far that gravitational pull toward the center of the universe will never yank all matter back or will the universe as we know it eventually lose momentum and collapse unto itself? If the BCT is right, wherever you go to escape Earth's demise (if we do not blow it up while we're still on it before then), physics will catch up with you in 20+ trillion years!

    13. Re:How many of these planets are habitable? by AvitarX · · Score: 2

      I think that closer to 100s years, and it sounds no crazier than trying to go from England to India the long way in the 1400 (not everyone made it, and but for an entire continent in-between, everyone would of died).

      --
      Wow, sent an e-mail as suggested when clicking on "use classic" banner, and got a fast response that addressed my msg
    14. Re:How many of these planets are habitable? by hazydave · · Score: 2

      Take the long term view. If mankind goes extinct, then absolutely nothing we every worried about in the short term matters one iota on that day after the last human dies. Right now, and as long as we're only on Earth, any number of catastrophies could kill us all in sort order, some we create, some that just happen. Either way, mankind and every thing it ever did ceases to matter at all.

      Or, we keep working to fix this ultimate problem. Taking the million year view, moving sustainably beyond earth is the most important thing humanity will every do.

      --
      -Dave Haynie
  2. BEER by Meneth · · Score: 2

    This new method is apparently known as the BEER effect. One wonders what Albert would have felt about that. :)

    1. Re:BEER by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

      He would have got pissed ...

  3. What Einstein would say if he were alive today: by jbeaupre · · Score: 2, Funny

    Help! Help! Let me out!

    (Yeah, I know he was cremated, but his brain is in a jar.)

    --
    The world is made by those who show up for the job.
    1. Re:What Einstein would say if he were alive today: by gregmonkey · · Score: 2

      (Yeah, I know he was cremated, but his brain is in a jar.)

      Actually it's on slides

  4. Re:Time we start thinking about propulsion and tra by hajus · · Score: 2

    It was thought it would require the mass of Jupiter, but that was changed due to a redesign. The new design requires as much energy as 70% of the US annual energy usage. High, but not astronomical anymore.

  5. Planets discovered by General Relativity by mbone · · Score: 4, Informative

    This planet was discovered by Lorentz boosting, the theory of which predates Einstein. Meanwhile, 20 exoplanets have been discovered to date using gravitational lensing, an application of General Relativity (a theory created by Einstein ) that was itself first predicted by Einstein. Somehow, the press release (and thus all the subsequent press) failed to mention these "Einstein planets."

    1. Re:Planets discovered by General Relativity by tlhIngan · · Score: 2

      What I don't quite understand is how they first explain how difficult it is to find these planets, relying on tiny changes in the star's luminosity because the planets themselves are too dim to observe directly, and then go on to describe this planet in great detail: diameter, the fact that it's tidally locked, temperature at different locations, jet stream winds,... On a planet 2000 light years away? How did they get this "stong evidence"? Did they tune in to a local alien weather station?

      They're not mutually incompatible.

      What you need to realize is that detecting planets is hard - because they're dim compared to their parent stars. So pointing your telescope at a random star may or may not reveal a planet.

      Basically, it's a problem because space is big. Really big. And modern theory has it's filled with "dark stuff" (energy or matter - they're equivalent with E=mc^2) of unknown composition.

      But once you know something's there, it's easier to analyze it - spectral analysis among other methods.

      Basically, finding a planet is looking for a needle in a haystack. Once you found the needle though, you can analyze the crap out of it as you know it exists and where it is.