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Community => Recreation Commons => Our researchers have made a breakthrough! => Topic started by: Buster's Uncle on March 16, 2017, 03:35:55 pm

Title: Mysterious free-floating ‘rogue planet’ may be even odder than we thought
Post by: Buster's Uncle on March 16, 2017, 03:35:55 pm

Mysterious ‘rogue planet’ floating through space may be even odder than we thought
Yahoo News UK
Rob Waugh  March 16, 2017


(https://www.yahoo.com/sy/ny/api/res/1.2/_R53UfKJBkQzMkjXh3Yq0w--/YXBwaWQ9aGlnaGxhbmRlcjtzbT0xO3c9NzQ0O2g9NDA5/http://media.zenfs.com/en/homerun/feed_manager_auto_publish_494/c0bd1f0f5ead6e73d540eb7695eed64c)
Picture Rex



A rogue planet spotted wandering through space on its own may be even stranger than scientists expected, after new analysis with NASA’s Spitzer space telescope.

The object, CFBDSIR J214947.2-040308.9, is 100 light years away from Earth – and was spotted in 2012.

Scientists are now puzzling over what the mysterious object is – is it a rogue, free-floating planet, or something even stranger?

Scientists now believe that the planet – found in 2012 – might be a ‘brown dwarf’ – an object too small to be a star, but too big to be a planet.

The researchers believe it’s either a young planet (around 500 million years old) – or a much older brown dwarf, ith a mass ranging from two to 40 Jupiter masses.

‘CFBDSIR 2149-0403 is an atypical substellar object that is either a ‘free-floating planet’ or a rare high-metallicity brown dwarf. Or a combination of both,’ said Dr Philippe Delorme from Grenoble Alpes University in France.

‘We now reject our initial hypothesis that CFBDSIR 2149-0403 would be a member of the AB Doradus moving group.

‘Though determining that certainly improved our knowledge of the object it also made it more difficult to study, by adding age as a free parameter.’


https://www.yahoo.com/news/mysterious-rogue-planet-floating-through-space-may-be-even-odder-than-we-thought-120713935.html (https://www.yahoo.com/news/mysterious-rogue-planet-floating-through-space-may-be-even-odder-than-we-thought-120713935.html)