The more we've learned about the planetary systems orbiting other stars in the galaxy, the more we've realised just how unusual our own Solar System is. Most exoplanetary systems have very different architectures to our own. The Kepler-11 system, for example, is exceedingly compact, with six planets crammed within the equivalent orbit of Venus. Other systems contain worlds with extremely elliptical orbits - such as HD 20782 b - which indicate significant past effects of gravitational interactions between planets. And one of the most common kinds of exoplanets to turn up in our astronomical searches is not present at all in the Solar System: super-Earths. Super-Earth planets have a mass several times larger than Earth's but substantially less than ice giants like Uranus and Neptune.
هذه القصة مأخوذة من طبعة June 2023 من BBC Sky at Night Magazine.
ابدأ النسخة التجريبية المجانية من Magzter GOLD لمدة 7 أيام للوصول إلى آلاف القصص المتميزة المنسقة وأكثر من 9,000 مجلة وصحيفة.
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هذه القصة مأخوذة من طبعة June 2023 من BBC Sky at Night Magazine.
ابدأ النسخة التجريبية المجانية من Magzter GOLD لمدة 7 أيام للوصول إلى آلاف القصص المتميزة المنسقة وأكثر من 9,000 مجلة وصحيفة.
بالفعل مشترك? تسجيل الدخول
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Researchers searching for life beyond Earth spend a lot of time thinking about what telltale signs might be detectable astronomically. Forms of unambiguous evidence for the presence of life on another world are known as biosignatures. By extension, techno signatures are indicators of activity by intelligent, civilisation-building life.
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Particles and corresponding antiparticles are very much alike, except they have opposite electrical charges. For instance, the antiparticle of the electron - known as the positron - has the same tiny mass, but while electrons carry a negative electrical charge, positrons are positively charged.
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The Big Bang produced a Universe filled almost exclusively with hydrogen and helium; all other elements - what astronomers call metals - were produced by stars, supernovae and everything that happens later. So if you can pick out a pristine star with no metals polluting it from among the billions in the Milky Way, then you are likely to have a star dating from our Galaxy's earliest days.
Inside The Sky At Night - Two years ago, exoplanet scientist Hannah Wakeford received some of the first data from the JWST
Two years ago, exoplanet scientist Hannah Wakeford received some of the first data from the JWST. In July's Sky at Night, we discovered what she's learned since then.
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