News tagged with planet formation

Related topics: earth , stars , planets , solar system

Baby galaxies grew up quickly

Baby galaxies from the young Universe more than 12 billion years ago evolved faster than previously thought, shows new research from the Niels Bohr Institute. This means that already in the early history of ...

Space & Earth / Astronomy

created May 16, 2012 | popularity 4.8 / 5 (5) | comments 67 | with audio podcast

Researchers say galaxy may swarm with 'nomad planets'

(PhysOrg.com) -- Our galaxy may be awash in homeless planets, wandering through space instead of orbiting a star.

Space & Earth / Astronomy

created Feb 23, 2012 | popularity 4.3 / 5 (23) | comments 31 | with audio podcast

Some stars capture rogue planets

(Phys.org) -- New research suggests that billions of stars in our galaxy have captured rogue planets that once roamed interstellar space. The nomad worlds, which were kicked out of the star systems in which ...

Space & Earth / Astronomy

created Apr 17, 2012 | popularity 4.8 / 5 (10) | comments 16 | with audio podcast

Astronomers discover a rare stellar disk of quartz dust

A research team of Japanese astronomers led by Dr. Hideaki Fujiwara (Subaru Telescope) has discovered a main-sequence star that is surrounded by a rare disk of quartz dust. Collisions of planetesimals, building ...

Space & Earth / Astronomy

created May 05, 2012 | popularity 5 / 5 (12) | comments 4 | with audio podcast

Flipping hot Jupiters: Why some planets orbit the wrong way

(PhysOrg.com) -- In the last few years astronomers have observed that in some extrasolar systems the star is spinning one way and the planet, a "hot Jupiter," is orbiting the star in the opposite direction. ...

Space & Earth / Astronomy

created May 11, 2011 | popularity 4.7 / 5 (10) | comments 23 | with audio podcast

Frozen comet had a watery past, scientists find

For the first time, scientists have found convincing evidence for the presence of liquid water in a comet, shattering the current paradigm that comets never get warm enough to melt the ice that makes up the ...

Space & Earth / Space Exploration

created Apr 05, 2011 | popularity 5 / 5 (5) | comments 5 | with audio podcast

Oxygen isotope analysis tells of the wandering life of a dust grain 4.5 billion years ago

Scientists have performed a micro-probe analysis of the core and outer layers of a pea-sized piece of a meteorite some 4.57 billion years old to reconstruct the history of its formation, providing the first ...

Space & Earth / Astronomy

created Mar 03, 2011 | popularity 4 / 5 (6) | comments 13 | with audio podcast

Six new planets discovered

(PhysOrg.com) -- An international team, including Oxford University scientists, has discovered six diverse new planets, from 'shrunken-Saturns' to 'bloated hot Jupiters', as well a rare brown dwarf with 60 ...

Space & Earth / Astronomy

created Jun 14, 2010 | popularity 4.8 / 5 (30) | comments 3 | with audio podcast

Putting the squeeze on planets outside our solar system

(PhysOrg.com) -- Using high-powered lasers, scientists at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and collaborators discovered that molten magnesium silicate undergoes a phase change in the liquid state, abruptly ...

Physics / Condensed Matter

created Feb 10, 2012 | popularity 4.2 / 5 (9) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Study of first high-resolution images of Pallas confirms asteroid is actually a protoplanet

(PhysOrg.com) -- Britney E. Schmidt, a UCLA doctoral student in the department of Earth and space sciences, wasn't sure what she'd glean from images of the asteroid Pallas taken by the Hubble Space Telescope. ...

Space & Earth / Astronomy

created Oct 12, 2009 | popularity 4.6 / 5 (22) | comments 7

A planetary system from the early Universe

A group of European astronomers has discovered an ancient planetary system that is likely to be a survivor from one of the earliest cosmic eras, 13 billion years ago. The system consists of the star HIP 11952 ...

Space & Earth / Astronomy

created Mar 27, 2012 | popularity 4.5 / 5 (13) | comments 13 | with audio podcast

Recipes for Renegade Planets

Recent discoveries of gas giant planets in unusual orbits challenge the generally accepted theory of planet formation. While these discoveries do not disprove the theory, they have opened our eyes to chaotic ...

Space & Earth / Astronomy

created Jul 08, 2010 | popularity 4.8 / 5 (11) | comments 2 | with audio podcast

How to Make a Planet: Spitzer Spots Clump of Swirling Planetary Material

(PhysOrg.com) -- Astronomers have witnessed odd behavior around a young star. Something, perhaps another star or a planet, appears to be pushing a clump of planet-forming material around. The observations, ...

Space & Earth / Astronomy

created Sep 23, 2009 | popularity 4.3 / 5 (6) | comments 1

When stellar metallicity sparks planet formation

New research predicts the criteria needed for Earth-like planets to form around a star that have one-tenth the metallicity of our Sun. If researchers find small, rocky planets orbiting stars with lower metallicity, ...

Space & Earth / Astronomy

created Apr 10, 2012 | popularity 5 / 5 (1) | comments 9 | with audio podcast

Rocky planets could have been born as gas giants

When NASA announced the discovery of over 1,200 new potential planets spotted by the Kepler Space Telescope, almost a quarter of them were thought to be Super-Earths. Now, new research suggests that these ...

Space & Earth / Astronomy

created Sep 16, 2011 | popularity 4.8 / 5 (11) | comments 38