Astronomers have discovered that free-floating planets, which are not bound to a host star, are much more abundant than planets in orbit. These solitary planets are believed to form within the gas and dust disks around young stars, similar to other planets. However, instead of staying in their star system, they are forcefully ejected into space.
Thanks, makes sense. Hmm maybe that's the case with the article. The main article I found on this was NYT and I can't get through their paywall at the moment so I went with that, but not ideal.
I wonder why AI thinks 'free floating planets' contain what looks like a robot that might be AI itself. Solipcism?
Previous estimates suggested that there were billions of these rogue planets in the Milky Way. However, recent research conducted by NASA and Osaka University in Japan indicates that the actual number might be in the trillions. The study was based on nine years of data collected from the Microlensing Observations in Astrophysics telescope in New Zealand, which indirectly detected exoplanets by measuring the gravitational effects they have on the light from distant stars.
The research unveiled that there are approximately six times more free-floating planets than planets that orbit stars. Furthermore, scientists identified the second Earth-sized free-floating planet ever found. Although the existence of these wandering worlds has been known for some time, little is understood about them.
Contrary to previous thinking that these rogue planets are similar in size to Jupiter, the study suggests that many of them are considerably smaller. This aligns with the theory that planets become rogue when two protoplanets collide, resulting in one of them being ejected from the star system. Larger planets like Jupiter are unlikely to be ejected without the presence of even bigger objects.
The abundance of free-floating planets in the Milky Way implies that the collision of planet-sized objects during the formation process may be more common than assumed. However, there is still uncertainty whether these planets are fully unleashed or if they have wide orbits that make it challenging to link them to a host star.
Future observations using advanced telescopes like the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope, scheduled for launch in 2027, might provide scientists with more data on free-floating planets. This, along with other observations, could offer a more direct measurement of their mass and a better understanding of their properties.
Add comment