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http://www.cnn.com/2009/TECH/space/09/16/new.rocky.planet/index.html(CNN) -- Scientists have discovered the first confirmed Earthlike planet outside our solar system, they announced Wednesday. "This is the first confirmed rocky planet in another system," astronomer Artie Hatzes told CNN, contrasting the solid planet with gaseous ones like Jupiter and Saturn. But "Earthlike" is a relative term. The planet's composition may be similar to that of Earth, but its environment is more like a vision of hell, the project's lead astronomer said. It is so close to the star it orbits "that the place may well look like Dante's Inferno, with a probable temperature on its 'day face' above 3,600 degrees Fahrenheit (2,000 degrees Celsius) and minus-328 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 200 degrees Celsius) on its night face," said Didier Queloz of Geneva Observatory in Switzerland, the project leader. Hatzes, explaining that one side of the body is always facing the star and the other side always faces away, said the side "facing the sun is probably molten. The other side could actually have ice" if there is water on the planet. "We think it has no atmosphere to redistribute the heat," Hatzes told CNN from Barcelona, Spain, where he is attending the "Pathways Towards Habitable Planets" conference. The astronomers were stunned to find a rocky planet so near a star, he said. "We would have never dreamed you would find a rocky planet so close," he said. "Its year is less than one of our days." The planet, known as CoRoT-7b, was detected early last year, but it took months of observation to determine that it had a composition roughly similar to Earth's, the European Southern Observatory said in a statement. Astronomers were able to measure the dimensions of the planet by watching as it passed in front of the star it orbits, then carried out 70 hours of study of the planet's effect on its star to infer its weight. With that information in hand, they were able to calculate its density -- and were thrilled with what they found, Hatzes said. "What makes this exciting is you compare the density of this planet to the planets in our solar system, it's only Mercury, Venus and Earth that are similar," Hatzes, of the Thuringer observatory in Germany, told CNN. They were helped by the fact that CoRoT-7b is relatively close to Earth -- about 500 light years away, in the constellation of Monoceros, the Unicorn. "It's in our solar neighborhood," Hatzes said. "The thing that made it easier is it's relatively close, so it's relatively bright. If this star was much much farther away, we wouldn't have been able to do these measurements." At about five times Earth's mass (though not quite twice as large in circumference), it is the smallest planet ever spotted outside our solar system. It also has the fastest orbit. The planet whizzes around its star more than seven times faster than Earth moves, and is 23 times closer to the star than Mercury is to our sun. The planet was first detected early in 2008 by the CoRoT satellite, a 30-centimeter space telescope launched by the European Space Agency in December 2006, specifically with the mission of detecting rocky planets outside the solar system. At least 42 scientists at 17 institutions on three continents worked on the project. They are publishing their findings in a special issue of the Astronomy and Astrophysics journal on October 22 as "The CoRoT-7 Planetary System: Two Orbiting Super-Earths." ~Lyuokdea
~Lyuokdea
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2nd String
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It still amazes me at just how HUGE outer space is, its hard to imagine at times that there are billions of stars in our own galaxy and there are billions and billions of other galaxies out there with billions and billions of stars and planets within those systems, how can Earth be the only planet with life out of an infinite amount of possiblilities, im sure other life does exist but the vast distances involved and current abilities of detection we'll never find them because space goes on forever. Wow I think i need a nap after thinking about that, lol. 
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Legend
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Does "outer space" have an end? If so, what's on the other side? Just a few questions we used to ask while getting high. 
And into the forest I go, to lose my mind and find my soul.
- John Muir
#GMSTRONG
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Thinking about space creeps me out for that very reason.
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Quote:
Does "outer space" have an end?
Mobius band.
Browns is the Browns
... there goes Joe Thomas, the best there ever was in this game.
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I'm no expert but i don't think they've ever detected an end but the furthest photo taken is the "Hubble Ultra Deep Field", that is like really, really, really far away and just shows a very small percentage of deep space and the galaxies seen are estimated at well over 10,000 and formed some 400 million years after the Big Bang, i'll put up a wiki link in case anyone hasn't seen or read about it. Hubble Ultra Deep Field
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Legend
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Quote:
I'm no expert but i don't think they've ever detected an end but the furthest photo taken is the "Hubble Ultra Deep Field", that is like really, really, really far away and just shows a very small percentage of deep space and the galaxies seen are estimated at well over 10,000 and formed some 400 million years after the Big Bang, i'll put up a wiki link in case anyone hasn't seen or read about it.
Hubble Ultra Deep Field
Wow, they can tell how old a galaxy is just by looking at a picture? But they can't say how old earth is with any certainty? And they live here.
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Mobius band.
It still has an edge, but I used to think it was something similar but not yet explained....where if you headed in one direction you'd eventually end up where you started. Damn, I feel like I'm at a dying party in high school.
And into the forest I go, to lose my mind and find my soul.
- John Muir
#GMSTRONG
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2nd String
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Quote:
Quote:
I'm no expert but i don't think they've ever detected an end but the furthest photo taken is the "Hubble Ultra Deep Field", that is like really, really, really far away and just shows a very small percentage of deep space and the galaxies seen are estimated at well over 10,000 and formed some 400 million years after the Big Bang, i'll put up a wiki link in case anyone hasn't seen or read about it.
Hubble Ultra Deep Field
Wow, they can tell how old a galaxy is just by looking at a picture? But they can't say how old earth is with any certainty? And they live here.
I have no idea how they come up with any of these figures and i'm sure the physics are way beyond my mental capacity but common sense tells me that all objects in space move away from a single point, which is how they came up with the Big Bang Theory and they calculate the rate of expansion from that single point of origin known as the Big Bang. Im giving myself a headache lol.
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Well, "they" do know how old the Earth is. It's 4.6 billion years old. Is it 100% right?....probably. The oldest rocks on Earth don't date that far back but they had guessed that and it was "confirmed" when scientists RC-dated some meteors to 4.6 billion years old. So essentially, all the crap floating around in our early solar system was about that old. And it ended up being part of Earth.
Space is crazy big but it's hard to really understand the distance. To travel to the nearest star from Earth, it would be 4 light years. Not that bad......Unfortunately, we can't travel at 176,000 miles per second. So that trip would take 150,000+ years in the space shuttle. Crazy!
And the one that truly baffles me...everything after Hydrogen and Helium in the periodic table was created in the centers of high mass stars. Some of those stars exploded to create enriched gas clouds that eventually formed star systems like ours. So, we and most of everything you see is star dust.
And anyway, I thought they already found a rocky planet in the Star Gleeza system. Oh well.
![[Linked Image]](http://www.dawgtalkers.net/uploads/Punchsmack/punch.gif) “...Iguodala to Curry, back to Iguodala, up for the layup! Oh! Blocked by James! LeBron James with the rejection!”
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"We would have never dreamed you would find a rocky planet so close," he said."
Wait a minute, I thought scienctists knew everything. I thought scientists were really, really, smart and thought they had it all figured out.
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Oh....they proved the expansion of the universe by using a process called redshift. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Redshift In physics and astronomy, redshift occurs when electromagnetic radiation—usually visible light—emitted or reflected by an object is shifted towards the (less energetic) red end of the electromagnetic spectrum due to the Doppler effect or other gravitationally-induced effects. More generally, redshift is defined as an increase in the wavelength of electromagnetic radiation received by a detector compared with the wavelength emitted by the source. This increase in wavelength corresponds to a drop in the frequency of the electromagnetic radiation. Conversely, a decrease in wavelength is called blue shift. So they can measure the expansion of the universe this way. How to tell the distance of the stars? They use the standard candle or Parallax theories. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_candle
“...Iguodala to Curry, back to Iguodala, up for the layup! Oh! Blocked by James! LeBron James with the rejection!”
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Lol space is waaaaaay to vast to have it all figured out, we haven't even scratched the surface of what exists in space nor will we ever figure it all out its too big for even some of the smartest brains to comprehend all of the data.
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I was not aware that 4.6 billion years of age was what earth was considered. That is what is "generally" accepted?
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Lol space is waaaaaay to vast to have it all figured out, we haven't even scratched the surface of what exists in space nor will we ever figure it all out its too big for even some of the smartest brains to comprehend all of the data.
Yup, I never heard any scientist claim to know everything. So, I don't think the sarcastic attack on "science" really holds water here. 
Heck, we still don't know what Dark Matter is...and it takes up about 70% of the mass in our own galaxy. They know it can't be seen...but it's there (by computing the size and rotation speed of the galaxy, you can somehow figure the mass).
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I was not aware that 4.6 billion years of age was what earth was considered. That is what is "generally" accepted?
Yeah. I watch too much of the science channel.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Age_of_earth
Last edited by Punchsmack; 09/16/09 07:52 PM.
“...Iguodala to Curry, back to Iguodala, up for the layup! Oh! Blocked by James! LeBron James with the rejection!”
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Modern geologists and geophysicists accept that the age of the Earth is around 4.54 billion years (4.54 × 109 years ± 1%).[1] [2] [3] This age has been determined by radiometric age dating of meteorite material and is consistent with the ages of the oldest-known terrestrial and lunar samples.
Following the scientific revolution and the development of radiometric age dating, measurements of lead in uranium-rich minerals showed that some were in excess of a billion years old.[4] The oldest such minerals analysed to date – small crystals of zircon from the Jack Hills of Western Australia – are at least 4.404 billion years old.[5][6][7] Comparing the mass and luminosity of the Sun to the multitudes of other stars, it appears that the solar system cannot be much older than those rocks. Ca-Al-rich inclusions (inclusions rich in calcium and aluminium) – the oldest known solid constituents within meteorites that are formed within the solar system – are 4.567 billion years old,[8][9] giving an age for the solar system and an upper limit for the age of Earth.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Age_of_the_Earth
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2nd String
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lol like i said a few posts up its beyond my mental capacity but always very interesting even if its hard to understand, thats why I love Michio Kaku, he always puts things in laymen terms so the average guy can understand it.
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Quote:
Quote:
I'm no expert but i don't think they've ever detected an end but the furthest photo taken is the "Hubble Ultra Deep Field", that is like really, really, really far away and just shows a very small percentage of deep space and the galaxies seen are estimated at well over 10,000 and formed some 400 million years after the Big Bang, i'll put up a wiki link in case anyone hasn't seen or read about it.
Hubble Ultra Deep Field
Wow, they can tell how old a galaxy is just by looking at a picture? But they can't say how old earth is with any certainty? And they live here.
I think most geophysicists agree the earth is about 4.54 billion years old. The little bit of debate that exists is kind of an argument of "at what point do you call a thing a thing" kind of argument. And it's between a few million and maybe a hundred million years difference. So the debate range is roughly between 4.46 and 4.62 billion years with most agreeing on about 4.54.
It's all conjecture of course. Some of this aging of the Universe and it's parts will eventually be proved inaccurate. Perhaps some of it will be surprisingly acurate. We'll see.
"Team Chemistry No Match for Team Biology" (Onion Sports Headline)
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I don't buy it! Nothing 4.5 billion years old is worth a crap! I turned 48 today and I'm all the evidence I need for my theory!!! 
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Legend
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lol like i said a few posts up its beyond my mental capacity but always very interesting even if its hard to understand, thats why I love Michio Kaku, he always puts things in laymen terms so the average guy can understand it.
That dude ROCKS!
I would suggest watching the show....The Universe. It's on the Science Channel. They are in season 4 or 5. Last night's episode was on Saturn and it's rings. There are other planets in our solar system with rings too. Unranus, Neptune and even Jupiter has rings.
In season one, they had a 2-hour special called "Beyond the Big Bang". It explains how the Big Bang theory became the widely held "standard" for the creation of the universe. And it starts all the way back to primitive man...to Galileo, Newton, Einstein, Hubble and all the current people. It's funny, the champion of the Big Bang Theory was an ordained Roman Catholic priest. And one of the pope's tried using his theory as proof of the book of genesis (something like that).
Anyway, it's a good watch.
“...Iguodala to Curry, back to Iguodala, up for the layup! Oh! Blocked by James! LeBron James with the rejection!”
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Legend
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I think most geophysicists agree the earth is about 4.54 billion years old. The little bit of debate that exists is kind of an argument of "at what point do you call a thing a thing" kind of argument. And it's between a few million and maybe a hundred million years difference.
That's what gets me - ah, 100 million years here, a hundred million years there......eh, we're close.
I guess it's just my small mind that can't grasp dating something to , well, plus or minus a hundred million years.
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Legend
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Something else to chew on ... our universe is already expanding at "hellafast" speeds. But that's only relative to things within the existing "viewable universe" ... The whole entity of the viewable universe could be traveling at speeds much faster than it's own expanding speed. And with the universe potentially being infinite in volume ... it's possible there could be another universe traveling just as fast right at our own current universe. If both speeds approached even half the speed of light, we could have a duel universal collision ... and we would have no idea it happened until it was all over. 
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2nd String
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Yeah i try to watch as many of those shows as i can, I also watch Discovery channels, "The Universe" whenever its on too. Anything with space always draws my interest sure beats watching another reality show thats for sure.
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I was not aware that 4.6 billion years of age was what earth was considered. That is what is "generally" accepted?
I wouldn't even say generally. That's what everything has told us over the past 50 years of research. It's not even a "best guess" at this point anymore.
Also, this is why they used the meteorite they did:
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The Canyon Diablo meteorite was used because it is a very large representative of a particularly rare type of meteorite that contains sulfide minerals (particularly troilite, FeS), metallic nickel-iron alloys, plus silicate minerals.
This is important because the presence of the three mineral phases allows investigation of isotopic dates using samples that provide a great separation in concentrations between parent and daughter nuclides. This is particularly true of uranium and lead. Lead is strongly chalcophilic and is found in the sulfide at a much greater concentration than in the silicate, versus uranium. Because of this segregation in the parent and daughter nuclides during the formation of the meteorite, this allowed a much more precise date of the formation of the solar disk and hence the planets than ever before.
The Canyon Diablo date has been backed up by hundreds of other dates, from both terrestrial samples and other meteorites.[34] The meteorite samples, however, show a spread from 4.53 to 4.58 billion years ago. This is interpreted as the duration of formation of the solar nebula and its collapse into the solar disk to form the Sun and the planets. This 50 million year time span allows for accretion of the planets from the original solar dust and meteorites.
The moon, as another extraterrestrial body that has not undergone plate tectonics and that has no atmosphere, provides quite precise age dates from the samples returned from the Apollo missions. Rocks returned from the moon have been dated at a maximum of around 4.4 and 4.5 billion years old.
Martian meteorites that have landed upon Earth have also been dated to around 4.5 billion years old by lead-lead dating. Lunar samples, since they have not been disturbed by weathering, plate tectonics or material moved by organisms, can also provide dating by direct electron microscope examination of cosmic ray tracks. The accumulation of dislocations generated by high energy cosmic ray particle impacts provides another confirmation of the isotopic dates. Cosmic ray dating is only useful on material that has not been melted, since melting erases the crystalline structure of the material, and wipes away the tracks left by the particles.
Altogether, the concordance of age dates of both the earliest terrestrial lead reservoirs and all other reservoirs within the solar system found to date are used to support the hypothesis that Earth and the rest of the solar system formed at around 4.53 to 4.58 billion years ago.
Snagged from the wiki page listed above
There are no sacred cows.
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I would suggest watching the show....The Universe. It's on the Science Channel. They are in season 4 or 5.
I know you'd think so, but "The Universe" is actually on the History channel.
[b]USNavyDawg (Ret.) ![[Linked Image from i87.photobucket.com]](http://i87.photobucket.com/albums/k155/brownsfan4173/NFL-Football.jpg)
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Do you want to know why it can only be measured to that specificity? Quote:
Because the exact accretion time of Earth is not yet known, and the predictions from different accretion models range from a few millions up to about 100 million years, the exact age of Earth is difficult to determine.
This is also from the wiki page. Also, you assume people in the know consider you to have a small mind for not understanding the topic, which is totally way off base IMO. I dont know anyone in the science field who would think this of someone who doesn't grasp their subject easily.
There are no sacred cows.
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Sorry, that's it. I have a series recording setup on my DVR. I don't really surf the channels anymore. So it's tranparent to me where this stuff comes from.
“...Iguodala to Curry, back to Iguodala, up for the layup! Oh! Blocked by James! LeBron James with the rejection!”
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2nd String
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ahh yes lol all this talk about space has turned my brain into mush. 
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Legend
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Something else to chew on ... our universe is already expanding at "hellafast" speeds. But that's only relative to things within the existing "viewable universe" ... The whole entity of the viewable universe could be traveling at speeds much faster than it's own expanding speed. And with the universe potentially being infinite in volume ... it's possible there could be another universe traveling just as fast right at our own current universe. If both speeds approached even half the speed of light, we could have a duel universal collision ... and we would have no idea it happened until it was all over.
That must be the year the Browns win The Super Bowl,....
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Legend
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It still amazes me at just how HUGE outer space is, its hard to imagine at times that there are billions of stars in our own galaxy and there are billions and billions of other galaxies out there with billions and billions of stars and planets within those systems, how can Earth be the only planet with life out of an infinite amount of possiblilities, im sure other life does exist but the vast distances involved and current abilities of detection we'll never find them because space goes on forever. Wow I think i need a nap after thinking about that, lol.
I agree,..they ARE OUT there, and are also having to deal with the realities of the space-time-continuum and the laws of simple physics. That's why we haven't heard from them,...yet.
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Oh....they proved the expansion of the universe by using a process called redshift.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Redshift
In physics and astronomy, redshift occurs when electromagnetic radiation—usually visible light—emitted or reflected by an object is shifted towards the (less energetic) red end of the electromagnetic spectrum due to the Doppler effect or other gravitationally-induced effects. More generally, redshift is defined as an increase in the wavelength of electromagnetic radiation received by a detector compared with the wavelength emitted by the source. This increase in wavelength corresponds to a drop in the frequency of the electromagnetic radiation. Conversely, a decrease in wavelength is called blue shift.
So they can measure the expansion of the universe this way.
How to tell the distance of the stars? They use the standard candle or Parallax theories.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_candle
Yup!....just to add on quickly....standard candle is the term given to just about anything that gives you a distance measurement to the galaxy. The trick is finding a standard candle that you can calibrate against known distance measurements (going back to the first standard candles like parallax which obviously hold from geometric arguments).
Then you can take that standard candle out to new distance measurements. Redshift is used at the largest distance scales, and it charts distance based on the relative motion between you and the object making the signal. Objects are known to be moving away at about 70 km / s / Mpc....so for very large distances the shift of light frequencies towards red light is quite drastic.
~Lyuokdea
~Lyuokdea
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Legend
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Wow, Thanks for that hubble link. That picture is amazing and just became my new Desktop Backround.
You know my love will Not Fade Away.........
#gmSTRONG
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Dawg Talker
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Astronomy Photo of the Day is your friend
There are no sacred cows.
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Wow, Thanks for that hubble link. That picture is amazing and just became my new Desktop Backround.
It's pictures like this that put thing's in perspective to me...
Milky Way Star Field
Scorpio Nebula Star Field
Another Hubble Star Field
"Team Chemistry No Match for Team Biology" (Onion Sports Headline)
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Legend
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I've been looking at these pics for about an hour now, Great Stuff. The new and improved Hubble pics are Amazing.
You know my love will Not Fade Away.........
#gmSTRONG
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Wow, they can tell how old a galaxy is just by looking at a picture? But they can't say how old earth is with any certainty? And they live here.
The Earth is anywhere from 4.5-5 billion years old. While .5 billion years is a huge range, they do have a pretty good idea of how old Earth is.
Edit: Saw others already answered.
I can't even begin to wrap my head around that number. Everything from Christ to now is such a small amount of time compared to the universe..It's just so crazy to me.
/high school pot times haha. 
Last edited by bignasty31; 09/16/09 11:11 PM.
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Quote:
I'm no expert but i don't think they've ever detected an end but the furthest photo taken is the "Hubble Ultra Deep Field", that is like really, really, really far away and just shows a very small percentage of deep space and the galaxies seen are estimated at well over 10,000 and formed some 400 million years after the Big Bang, i'll put up a wiki link in case anyone hasn't seen or read about it.
Hubble Ultra Deep Field
We haven't seen an "end" so to speak, and we likely won't. The size of the observable universe is currently about 46.5 billion light years away (that's the distance at the current time, though due to the expansion of the universe, the light hasn't actually travelled 46.5 billion light years to get to us).
In terms of farthest images back.... it really depends on whether you are only talking about images of observable light (i.e. photons of energies that a human could see). The oldest photon based image is the image of the microwave background radiation. This is image of the universe at the time when the first atoms were formed (~400,000 years after the big bang). The photons that were created in this era have since been redshifted to such an extent that they are now microwaves (very low energy).
Before this time period, there can be no imaging using light, because without atoms, there were lots of electrons and protons floating free everywhere, these particles are very good at absorbing, scattering, and diffracting light, and so any light beam from before 400,000 years in the past was being absorbed and reemitted continuously (we say that at this time period, the universe was optically opaque). However, there are current efforts to observe even earlier stages of the universe using neutrinos or gravitons (which were floating freely through the universe much earlier).
The very cool part about the microwave background radiation is that it is the same in every direction that we point the telescope. It was quite surprising that parts of the galaxy that are now 80 billion light years away, all looked the exact same 13 billion years ago. This greatly supported the big bang scenario, as it was necessary to have a universe that at one point in history were in communication with each other (close enough for light to move between the two), or else there is no way to explain why the universe looks the same everywhere.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cosmic_microwave_background_radiation
~Lyuokdea
~Lyuokdea
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Joined: Sep 2006
Posts: 15,123
Legend
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Legend
Joined: Sep 2006
Posts: 15,123 |
Quote:
it's too big for even some of the smartest brains to comprehend all of the data.
Not too big for me.
The answer is 42.
"too many notes, not enough music-"
#GMStong
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Joined: Sep 2006
Posts: 13,389
Legend
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Legend
Joined: Sep 2006
Posts: 13,389 |
Some of you guys are smart nerdy types. But its time to end this childish fascination with Star Trek and space and get to worrying about problems on THIS planet. I wonder how much money goes into outer space??? Scients been studying outer space for decades and centuries and where are we? Oh well... I give humans another hundred years or so, before we screw up mightily.... maybe less. We're too weak & greedy, the only species that wants far more than it needs. And we're supposed to be the smart ones.  It's my own Big Bang Theory.
Last edited by lampdogg; 09/17/09 09:28 AM.
![[Linked Image from i28.photobucket.com]](http://i28.photobucket.com/albums/c201/shadedog/mcenroe2.jpg) gmstrong -----------------
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Joined: Sep 2006
Posts: 10,246
Legend
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Legend
Joined: Sep 2006
Posts: 10,246 |
Quote:
First rocky planet found outside of solar system
I'm still waiting for scientists to discover the Clubber Lang planet.
I am unfamiliar with this feeling of optimism
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DawgTalkers.net
Forums DawgTalk Tailgate Forum First rocky planet found outside
of solar system - CNN.com
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