Astronomers Observe Exoplanet Temperatures Swinging Wildly
For the first time ever, scientists in the United Kingdom detected temperature fluctuations on a super-Earth exoplanet – 55 Cancri e, the so-called “diamond planet.” Using NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope to study the rocky exoplanet’s thermal radiation over a two-year period, researchers led by the University of Cambridge found that the temperature on the side […]
Ground-Based Telescope Observes Exoplanet Transiting Bright Star
For the first time, an international team of astronomers has used a ground-based telescope to detect and observe the transit of a planet in front of a Sun-like star outside of our own solar system. Until now, only space-based telescopes were capable of detecting the transits of exoplanets as they passed by bright stars. Distortions […]
Giant Jovian Moon Might Have an Ocean and Ice ‘Club Sandwich’
Ganymede is Jupiter’s largest moon; in fact it’s the solar system’s biggest moon. Now members of the Icy Worlds team at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) think that the giant moon, which is even larger than the planet Mercury, may have several layers of ice and liquid oceans piled atop each other, much like a […]
Scientists Discover Planet Covered in Diamonds
Scientists have found a planet outside of our solar system which could be a true diamond in the rough. This gem of a planet is twice Earth’s size, according to the US-Franco team that found it, and its surface appears to be covered in graphite and diamond. Researchers estimate that at least one-third of the […]
Science Scanner: NASA Detects Light from Earth-like Planet
It what it calls an historic step in the search for signs of life on other planets, NASA says its astronomers have detected light coming from a “super-Earth” planet 41 light years away. It marks the first time direct light from a rocky super-Earth planet has been seen, researchers said. The planet, called 55 Cancri […]