Five earth size planets found

[DiveCon]

so "earth sized" is the same as "earth like"?

Not necessarily, but generally speaking. Earth like planets are "rocky" not gaseous planets, but also, and I'm only giving an opinion, Earth like planets are also planets in orbits conducive to supporting life. Earth like planets might be 10 times more massive than Earth, but probably not much smaller vis-a-vis Mars.

well, as far as i can tell from the reports on this, they only claimed earth sized
and i havent seen anywhere that they know these are not gas giants

 

[Robert_Stephens]

Earth like is Earth like. Earth size is planets within 6% of Earth's size irregardless if whether it is earth like or not. That is the difference. For instance, Venus is nearly earth like in size, but is so totally different as a planetary body that it is a whole other magnitude of definition for what it is in comparison.

Hope that helps.

Robert

 

[American Horse]

so "earth sized" is the same as "earth like"?

Not necessarily, but generally speaking. Earth like planets are "rocky" not gaseous planets, but also, and I'm only giving an opinion, Earth like planets are also planets in orbits conducive to supporting life. Earth like planets might be 10 times more massive than Earth, but probably not much smaller vis-a-vis Mars.

well, as far as i can tell from the reports on this, they only claimed earth sized
and i havent seen anywhere that they know these are not gas giants

As I've followed these reports in the past there have been planets 10-tiimes more massive than Earth that have been called Earth like. Planets some multiple larger than Earth coalesce gases, and tend to run away in that direction, becoming gas giants.

Notice that in our solar system, the largest planets, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune are all gas giants, are in the outer solar system, and the inner planets (Mars, Earth, Venus, Mercury) are all rocky and thus Earth-like. Once it was thought that this schematic (with the exception of Pluto which was a variant and is no longer classed as a true planet) would be universal in planetary accretion, but we have discovered that gas planets can be in very close orbits to their primary; hence "hot Jupiters" (there are also hot Neptunes)

Gas giants are by definition not "Earth like" planets. Venus, although it has a heavy atmosphere is not a gas planet, but an Earth like (rocky) planet with a run-away atmosphere.

So far all the planets, because of our methods of detection, have been close-in to their primaries.


some interesting videos:

A Hot Jupiter



A small 5-Earth mass planet and a hot Neptune



EDIT: BTW Welcome aboard Robert_Stevens!

 

[DiveCon]

Earth like is Earth like. Earth size is planets within 6% of Earth's size irregardless if whether it is earth like or not. That is the difference. For instance, Venus is nearly earth like in size, but is so totally different as a planetary body that it is a whole other magnitude of definition for what it is in comparison.

Hope that helps.

Robert

well, Chris stated they were "earth like" not me

yet i posted this earlier

calling them "earth sized" is not exactly the truth

they dont exactly look "earth sized" using your 6% figure

 

[American Horse]

Earth like is Earth like. Earth size is planets within 6% of Earth's size irregardless if whether it is earth like or not. That is the difference. For instance, Venus is nearly earth like in size, but is so totally different as a planetary body that it is a whole other magnitude of definition for what it is in comparison.

Hope that helps.

Robert

well, Chris stated they were "earth like" not me

yet i posted this earlier

calling them "earth sized" is not exactly the truth

they dont exactly look "earth sized" using your 6% figure

Dive, I don't know where that image was imported from, but those would all seem to have to be gas giants. If this image was related to the 5 earth-like planets discovered, then there has been a transposition of images of some sort. The url says "Kepler_first_five_exoplanet_size" so what's up with that? It seems these were the first 5-exoplanets found by Kepler, and no mention was made that those specifically were Earth-like.

Robert, I've never read anything before about a 6% to Earth size variance being classed as Earth type, so I'm not sure where that came from. I get about all my astro-info from Astronomy Magazine and BAUT

 

[DiveCon]

Earth like is Earth like. Earth size is planets within 6% of Earth's size irregardless if whether it is earth like or not. That is the difference. For instance, Venus is nearly earth like in size, but is so totally different as a planetary body that it is a whole other magnitude of definition for what it is in comparison.

Hope that helps.

Robert

well, Chris stated they were "earth like" not me

yet i posted this earlier

calling them "earth sized" is not exactly the truth

they dont exactly look "earth sized" using your 6% figure

Dive, I don't know where that image was imported from, but those would all see to have to be gas giants. If this image was related to the 5 earth-like planets discovered, then there has been a transposition of images of some sort. The url says "Kepler_first_five_exoplanet_size" so what's up with that? It seems these were the first 5-exoplanets found by Kepler, and no mention was made that those specifically were Earth-like.

Robert, I've never read anything before about a 6% to Earth size variance being classed as Earth type, so I'm not sure where that came from. I get about all my astro-info from Astronomy Magazine and BAUT

yes, that is a graphic relating to the 5 Kepler planets
i found it on wikipedia, but they had to get it somewhere else, where i have no idea
but no one challenged that image in this thread

 

[American Horse]

yes, that is a graphic relating to the 5 Kepler planets
i found it on wikipedia, but they had to get it somewhere else, where i have no idea
but no one challenged that image in this thread

I saw it, and thought that it was unrelated to the topic so I just let it go as another set of images, and it is; sorry about that.

 

[Robert_Stephens]

Ok, everyone and the posts are quick and I can't follow fast enough--sorry about that--DUH!....haha..

Thanks for the wonderful welcome from everyone also. Great stuff and superb topics and questions and material.

Ok, first off, that article is altered and falsified greatly from its original appearance at the HST site. Its been so distorted I myself cannot make hide nor hair of it. The original at the HST site shows 6 planets, all hot Jupiters all in the Goldilocks zone, but too hot to support life and none Class C or Earth like. What is vexing is that they are all orbiting very close to the parent star, or if they were in are solar system, they would all be within the orbit of Mars.

When I got 15 posts in and up here, I can then post urls so I can verify for all of us what the subject is.

The latest Earth Like planet system is Gilese581 and one can look that up and see the comparison and findings. The planets within are still too big to be Earth like, but they are close.

Wish I could do better with all these queries. Sure s fun though.

Robert

 

[DiveCon]

Ok, everyone and the posts are quick and I can't follow fast enough--sorry about that--DUH!....haha..

Thanks for the wonderful welcome from everyone also. Great stuff and superb topics and questions and material.

Ok, first off, that article is altered and falsified greatly from its original appearance at the HST site. Its been so distorted I myself cannot make hide nor hair of it. The original at the HST site shows 6 planets, all hot Jupiters all in the Goldilocks zone, but too hot to support life and none Class C or Earth like. What is vexing is that they are all orbiting very close to the parent star, or if they were in are solar system, they would all be within the orbit of Mars.

When I got 15 posts in and up here, I can then post urls so I can verify for all of us what the subject is.

The latest Earth Like planet system is Gilese581 and one can look that up and see the comparison and findings. The planets within are still too big to be Earth like, but they are close.

Wish I could do better with all these queries. Sure s fun though.

Robert

thanks for your posts
i have enjoyed reading them so far
and its always good to have new thoughts added to the mix

 

[dalethomas1]

It is a great research and may be help be becomes helpful to search life on other planet.

 

[Robert_Stephens]

Ok, everyone and the posts are quick and I can't follow fast enough--sorry about that--DUH!....haha..

Thanks for the wonderful welcome from everyone also. Great stuff and superb topics and questions and material.

Ok, first off, that article is altered and falsified greatly from its original appearance at the HST site. Its been so distorted I myself cannot make hide nor hair of it. The original at the HST site shows 6 planets, all hot Jupiters all in the Goldilocks zone, but too hot to support life and none Class C or Earth like. What is vexing is that they are all orbiting very close to the parent star, or if they were in are solar system, they would all be within the orbit of Mars.

When I got 15 posts in and up here, I can then post urls so I can verify for all of us what the subject is.

The latest Earth Like planet system is Gilese581 and one can look that up and see the comparison and findings. The planets within are still too big to be Earth like, but they are close.

Wish I could do better with all these queries. Sure s fun though.

Robert

thanks for your posts
i have enjoyed reading them so far
and its always good to have new thoughts added to the mix

Thank you so much and you all are great to interface with on all this cool stuff. Love it. Thank you all for having me here.

Robert

 

[Chris]

WASHINGTON -- NASA's Kepler mission confirmed the discovery of its first rocky planet, named Kepler-10b. Measuring 1.4 times the size of Earth, it is the smallest planet ever discovered outside our solar system.

The discovery of this so-called exoplanet is based on more than eight months of data collected by the spacecraft from May 2009 to early January 2010.

"All of Kepler's best capabilities have converged to yield the first solid evidence of a rocky planet orbiting a star other than our sun," said Natalie Batalha, Kepler's deputy science team lead at NASA's Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, Calif., and primary author of a paper on the discovery accepted by the Astrophysical Journal. "The Kepler team made a commitment in 2010 about finding the telltale signatures of small planets in the data, and it's beginning to pay off."

Kepler's ultra-precise photometer measures the tiny decrease in a star's brightness that occurs when a planet crosses in front of it. The size of the planet can be derived from these periodic dips in brightness. The distance between the planet and the star is calculated by measuring the time between successive dips as the planet orbits the star.

Kepler is the first NASA mission capable of finding Earth-size planets in or near the habitable zone, the region in a planetary system where liquid water can exist on the planet's surface. However, since it orbits once every 0.84 days, Kepler-10b is more than 20 times closer to its star than Mercury is to our sun and not in the habitable zone.

Kepler-10 was the first star identified that could potentially harbor a small transiting planet, placing it at the top of the list for ground-based observations with the W.M. Keck Observatory 10-meter telescope in Hawaii.
Scientists waiting for a signal to confirm Kepler-10b as a planet were not disappointed. Keck was able to measure tiny changes in the star's spectrum, called Doppler shifts, caused by the telltale tug exerted by the orbiting planet on the star.

"The discovery of Kepler 10-b is a significant milestone in the search for planets similar to our own," said Douglas Hudgins, Kepler program scientist at NASA Headquarters in Washington. "Although this planet is not in the habitable zone, the exciting find showcases the kinds of discoveries made possible by the mission and the promise of many more to come," he said.

Kepler: NASA's Kepler Mission Discovers Its First Rocky Planet

 

[Chris]

Here's a link to the discovery page on Kepler...

Kepler Discoveries

 

[American Horse]

WASHINGTON -- NASA's Kepler mission confirmed the discovery of its first rocky planet, named Kepler-10b. Measuring 1.4 times the size of Earth, it is the smallest planet ever discovered outside our solar system.

The discovery of this so-called exoplanet is based on more than eight months of data collected by the spacecraft from May 2009 to early January 2010.

"All of Kepler's best capabilities have converged to yield the first solid evidence of a rocky planet orbiting a star other than our sun," said Natalie Batalha, Kepler's deputy science team lead at NASA's Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, Calif., and primary author of a paper on the discovery accepted by the Astrophysical Journal. "The Kepler team made a commitment in 2010 about finding the telltale signatures of small planets in the data, and it's beginning to pay off."

Kepler's ultra-precise photometer measures the tiny decrease in a star's brightness that occurs when a planet crosses in front of it. The size of the planet can be derived from these periodic dips in brightness. The distance between the planet and the star is calculated by measuring the time between successive dips as the planet orbits the star.

Kepler is the first NASA mission capable of finding Earth-size planets in or near the habitable zone, the region in a planetary system where liquid water can exist on the planet's surface. However, since it orbits once every 0.84 days, Kepler-10b is more than 20 times closer to its star than Mercury is to our sun and not in the habitable zone.

Kepler-10 was the first star identified that could potentially harbor a small transiting planet, placing it at the top of the list for ground-based observations with the W.M. Keck Observatory 10-meter telescope in Hawaii.
Scientists waiting for a signal to confirm Kepler-10b as a planet were not disappointed. Keck was able to measure tiny changes in the star's spectrum, called Doppler shifts, caused by the telltale tug exerted by the orbiting planet on the star.

"The discovery of Kepler 10-b is a significant milestone in the search for planets similar to our own," said Douglas Hudgins, Kepler program scientist at NASA Headquarters in Washington. "Although this planet is not in the habitable zone, the exciting find showcases the kinds of discoveries made possible by the mission and the promise of many more to come," he said.

Kepler: NASA's Kepler Mission Discovers Its First Rocky Planet

Good solid information Chris.


Some information and perspective on the detection method: "Transiting" refers to the fact that we are detecting planets (of any size) as they pass (transit) visually across the face of these stars being monitored

Below is an image of an earth sized planet which happens to be Venus, transiting the face of our own star. The alignment is perfect because all nine planets lie within the ecliptic or the sun's planetary orbital plane, since they formed out of the plane of the forming suns accretion disc. Venus is only about 26 millions of miles from the terrestrial view point (its diameter is about 7520 miles - earth about 7,930) and the the disc of the sun is about 860,000 miles across or about an average of 32-arc minutes in apparent diameter.

 

[Chris]

Scientists on the Kepler mission revealed Saturday that you're probably going to have to wait until at least 2012 to find out anything substantial about the habitability of what appear to be Earth-sized planets. That's because scientists need to be able to see three transits of a planet around a star in three years before they'd be willing to say too much about them, and the project has only been going since 2009 (after all, our planet goes around the sun three times in three years).

And even then, Kepler wasn't designed to look at individual planets. But it might identify some that the James Webb Space Telescope, which will launch in 2014, can probe in further detail, looking at atmospheres and such. And note that the probability of having found our own particular planet using Kepler technology is only 12%.

Scientists pleasantly surprised by number of Earth-size, distant planets – This Just In - CNN.com Blogs

 

[saveliberty]

Can anyone confirm the discovery of intelligent life on Earth?