Friday, October 26, 2012

Zombie allusions: They just keep on coming-"in a nice ring-sculpting orbit"

http://www.space.com/18238-undead-alien-planet-fomalhaut-b-zombie.html



Huge 'Zombie' Alien Planet Rises from the Dead

Date: 26 October 2012




"The new study also pins down Fomalhaut b's orbital characteristics, finding that the planet's gravity could indeed be shaping the debris disk, researchers said.

"What we've seen from our analysis is that the object's minimum distance from the disk has hardly changed at all in two years, which is a good sign that it's in a nice ring-sculpting orbit," said co-author Timothy Rodigas of the University of Arizona.

The team also attempted to spot Fomalhaut b in the infrared using Hawaii's Subaru Telescope but came up empty. The non-detections with Subaru and Spitzer imply that the planet's mass must be less than twice that of Jupiter, researchers said."

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