I forgot to post this a couple weeks back! It was the 20-year anniversary of one of the first exoplanets
ever found - and it was lurking around a pulsar!
Draugr (Norse for "undead creatures") is one of three planets that orbits the pulsar Lich (also an undead creature).
The official name of the system is PSR B1257+12 and it features the three planets in orbit around the nasty pulsar.
It's located about 1900 light-years away in the constellation Virgo and was discovered in 1994, two years after the first two exoplanets were found around Lich.
The EXTREMELY NEAT thing about Draugr is that, to date, it remains the least massive exoplanet ever discovered, even when compared to the planets in our Solar System - which tells us something!
Found through pulsar timing, its mass is only ~2 times the lunar mass.
In a groundbreaking discovery, astronomers have identified an Earth-sized planet closer and younger than any previously known. During this week's #SETILive, communications specialist Beth Johnson spoke with lead authors Melinda Soares-Furtado and Benjamin Capistrant about this amazing discovery and the implications for planetary formation studies.
Next #SETILive: Exploring a Hot, Young World
TODAY, Apr 25, 2:30 PM PDT / 5:30 PM EDT
In a groundbreaking discovery, astronomers have identified an Earth-sized planet closer and younger than any previously known.
Communications specialist Beth Johnson speaks with lead authors Melinda Soares-Furtado and Benjamin Capistrant about this amazing discovery and the implications for planetary formation studies.
21-MAR-2024
James Webb Space Telescope captures the end of planet formation
How much time do planets have to form from a swirling disk of gas and dust around a star? A new University of Arizona-led study gives scientists a better idea of how our own solar system came to be.
For the first time, researchers, including Naman Bajaj from the University of Arizona and Dr. Uma Gorti from the SETI Institute, have captured images of winds emanating from an aging yet still young planet-forming disk, offering vital clues on the dispersal of gas crucial for the formation of planets.
In a paper published in the Astronomical Journal, a team of scientists led by Naman Bajaj of the University of Arizona and including Dr. Uma Gorti at the SETI Institute, image for the first time, an old planet-forming disk (still very young relative to the Sun) which is actively dispersing its gas content.
An article published in the journal "Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society" reports the identification of the exoplanet TOI-715 b in an orbit around its star in a position that meets the most conservative definition of a habitable zone.
"At just 1.55 times the Earth's radius, it's fairly small for a planet of its type. But what really caught the researchers' attention was its suspected sibling, which they believe is even smaller and also roughly the size of our own planet, lurking within the same region."
🌌 The Best Neighborhoods for Starting a Life in the Galaxy
—Quanta Magazine
“Was life on Earth inevitable? Was it special?” Chandra asked. “Only once you start to have this global picture … can you begin to answer questions like that.”