A study led by researchers from Tel Aviv University discovered two planets of the "hot Jupiter" type. The researchers: Gaia's cutting-edge technology is creating a real revolution in the world of astronomy
A new discovery led by researchers from Tel Aviv University: the Gaia spacecraft of the European Space Agency ESA recently identified two new planets in distant solar systems. This is the first time that Gaia succeeds in locating new planets and therefore the planets were named Gaia-1b and Gaia-2b.
The research was conducted under the leadership of Prof. Shai Zucker, head of the Porter School of Environment and Earth Sciences, and doctoral student Aviad Panhi from the School of Physics and Astronomy. The research conducted in collaboration with the European Space Agency and the Gaia Space Telescope research group was published in the scientific journal Astronomy & Astrophysics.
In our solar system there are eight planets - huge spheres that circle the sun in a cyclical motion. Less well known are the hundreds of billions of other planets in our galaxy, the Milky Way, which contains unimaginable amounts of solar systems. Planets in distant solar systems were first discovered in 1995 and since then they have been the object of constant research by astronomers, hoping to learn more about our solar system with their help.
Aviad Panchai elaborates: "The planets were discovered thanks to the fact that they partially hide their suns every time they fill the cup, and cause a cyclical decrease in the intensity of the light that reaches us from that distant sun. To make sure that these are indeed planets, we performed follow-up measurements with an American telescope called The Large Binocular Telescope Located in Arizona, this telescope is equipped with two huge mirrors, each 8.4 meters in diameter. and make it one of the largest telescopes in the world today. With this telescope it is possible to monitor small fluctuations of the star caused by the presence of a planet around it."
Gaia is a spacecraft of the European Space Agency ESA, whose main purpose is the 2D mapping of the structure of our galaxy, the Milky Way Galaxy, with unprecedented precision. For this mission, Gaia scans the sky as it rotates around an axis, tracking the position of about 10 billion suns in our galaxy with an accuracy reaching millions of degrees. To illustrate, such accuracy is equivalent to being able to identify from Earth a NIS XNUMX coin found on the moon. While tracking the positions of the suns, Gaia also measures their brightness - an extremely important feature in observational astronomy, since a lot can be learned from it about the physical characteristics of celestial bodies. The changes recorded in the brightness of two distant suns are what led to the discovery.
Prof. Zucker has extensive experience in discovering planets since the days when he was a student of the veteran astronomer Prof. Zvi Maza. He says: "The measurements we performed with the telescope in the USA confirmed that these are two huge planets, similar in size to the planet Jupiter in the solar system ours, and are so close to their suns that they complete the coffee in less than four days, i.e. every year on Earth that weighs For 90 years of that planet. The discovery was made possible following meticulous searches and using artificial intelligence methods, and this is how the two new planets were found. We will soon announce about 40 more candidates. The data continues to accumulate, and it is very likely that Gaia will discover many more planets using this method in the future."
This discovery is another milestone in the scientific contribution of the Gaia space mission, which is already credited with a real revolution in the world of astronomy. Gaia's ability to detect planets using the partial occultation method, which normally requires continuous monitoring for a long time, has so far been questionable. The team of researchers tasked with this task developed an algorithm specially adapted to the characteristics of Gaia and for years searched for these signals in the databases accumulated from the spacecraft.
And what about the possibility of sustaining life on those distant and new planets? Aviad Panhai concludes: "As mentioned, the new planets are very close to their suns and therefore the temperature in them is extremely high, around a thousand degrees Celsius, so the chance that life developed there is zero. A planet of this type is called in the astronomical community 'Hot Jupiter' -" Jupiter' due to its size, and 'hot' due to its proximity to the sun. Although the planets we found have no real chance of life, I am convinced that there are countless others that do life, and it is likely that in the coming years we will discover signs of organic molecules in the atmospheres of distant planets. We probably won't get to visit those distant worlds in the near future, but we are only at the beginning, and it is very exciting to be part of the search."
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Thanks for the interesting information.
Of course, there is no possibility of an article about stars without the constant Hinduism of consciousness about the certainty of finding life on other planets even when it does not arise from the subject in question and is not related to it.