Astronomers have discovered an exoplanean in the Alpha Centralavir system, which is the closest star system to the country. The scientist of Perm Polytechnic University explained why the new exoplope is called a ghost and what matters to science. The press service of the educational institution informed "Gazeta.ru" about this.
The first detection of the object took place in 2024. The cosmic telescope of James Web has used the Miri infrared device, which allowed to detect weak heat radiation. However, the views of bright stars, Alpha CENTER A եւ B have made observations extremely difficult. The signal was 10 thousand times weaker than the starlight of the star.
"It took a long time to confirm that this is an exoplope, not a passing asteroid. Modern devices have allowed to reduce radiation brightness from mother stars and discover a very weak signal. According to estimates, the planet is located about 2 astronomical units from Alpha Centralavir A, "said Yevgeny Burmistrov, an astronomy expert at Perm Polytechnic University.
The exoplose turned out to be a typical gas giant. Its mass is 90-150 times higher than the country's mass, and the size is a little large. The atmosphere consist mainly of hydrogen and helium, and the object does not have a solid surface.
"It has long been believed that the planets are very rarely formed in binary systems due to gravitational disorders. However, this discovery toured our ideas about the formation of planets. It turned out that stable worlds could even occur in such "unstable" conditions, "Burmistrov said.
Although the gas giant itself is not suitable for life (the average temperature is about -48 ° C), its satellites can be located in the "Golden" zone, where conditions allow the terms of liquid water. Like Jupiter Europe or Saturn's Enjoy Enjoy, such satellites can hide all oceans under the ice.
However, this year double observations did not confirm the existence of the planet. Scientists called the object "ghost". It seems to have disappeared from the sight. There are various options, from the catastrophic conflict and push out of the system to the impact of "lighting" by star.
"Most likely, the bright light of the neighboring star makes the planet invisible for telescopes. It is expected that it will be visible in 2026-2027 again, "the expert explained.
Translation of: Euromedia24.com
