Humans have longed to believe in extrasolar planets, as surely there have to be planets elsewhere in the universe. Claims of supposedly discovered extrasolar planets can be dated back to 1855 when Captain S. W. Jacobs from the Madras observatory, claimed that he had discovered a planet orbiting a binary system (Jacobs 1855), all the way up until 1991 when a team of astronomers announced then retracted the alleged discovery of an extrasolar planet around a pulsar star (Lyne and Bailes 1992). Planets are extremely hard to detect as they are a very faint light source and the light from its parent star is much brighter and essentially blocks out light from a planet (Winters 1996). It was not until 1992 when the first exoplanets were confirmed orbiting a pulsar star (Wolszczan and Frail 1992). Finally in 1995, the first exoplanet orbiting a main sequence star, a star like our sun, was discovered (Mayor and Queloz 1995).
The very first extrasolar planets were discovered to be two Earth-like planets orbiting a pulsar star (Wolszczan and Frail 1992). A pulsar star is a neutron star that is constantly emitting beams of radiation, these beams of radiation occur because of a misalignment of the neutron’s star’s rotation axis and its magnetic axis (Pulsars 2011). The misalignment coupled with a neutron stars intense magnetic field and rapid rotation cause it to create intense electric fields where electrons are accelerated to high velocities where they produce radiation in the form of light. Even though pulsar stars are always emitting radiation, they seem to pulsate in relation to far away observers because the rotation of the neutron star causes the radiation within its magnetic field to sweep in and out, “pulsate”, of an observer’s line ...
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The research area of detecting exoplanets, planets outside our own solar system, is a huge area of interest and funding. The importance of being able to detect these planets is they can give us information and an insight into planetary formation, to help the search for ”Earth- like” planets in the habitable zone, and of course the ever-present question of extraterrestrial life. So on order to attempt to gather information about these things we must be have solid detection techniques in place for exoplanets. A few of the important methods shall be discussed here, including the radial velocity method, transit method, direct imaging and gravitational microlensing among others .
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This paper presents an analysis of visible and IR (JHKL) data for 2 Long Period Variables (LPV). The four pulsating variables chosen are classified as Miras. All Miras stars are Long period variables that exhibit a very large change in visible light because they are cool (less than or equal to 3000K), and so most of their radiation lies in the infrared. We are studying the Mira stars instead the irregular stars because to understand any star you must first start with the simplest model then expand upon that, Mira are relatively well-behaved long period variable.
“The Cieorgium Sidus,” is the name William Herschel gave to the discovery he made in 1772. Uranus, a blue planet lined with eleven rings that can only be seen every 42 Earth years, is a planet that has been studied now for centuries but still holds many mysteries.
The main theme of “Lives of the Planets,” is the origin and composition of each planet and the universe surrounding them. This book takes the reader on a journey through the solar system, and discusses each planet in great detail. “Lives of the Planets,” was
[5] Rossi, A., "Long Term Evolution of Earth Orbiting Objects," [Online Document], 1996 Mar 12, [cited 2000 November 17], Available HTTP: http://apollo.cnuce.cnr.it/~rossi/publications/oslo/oslo.html
Although Pluto was discovered in 1930, limited information on the distant planet delayed a realistic understanding of its characteristics. Today Pluto remains the only planet that has not been visited by a spacecraft, yet an increasing amount of information is unfolding about this peculiar planet. The uniqueness of Pluto's orbit, rotational relationship with its satellite, spin axis, and light variations all give the planet a certain appeal.
No two astronomers made quite as significant contributions to their field during the European renaissance like Nicholas Copernicus and Tycho Brahe. There were serious flaws to the widely-accepted Ptolemaic model of the solar system, and these two scientists sought out to correct those flaws. While their approaches and models were very different, the most prominent and new feature of their models were revolutionary and accepted today.
The history of the planet's discovery is the first we have of its kind; Uranus was the first planet to be discovered with a telescope. The circumstances surrounding the discovery of the object are befitting of the odd planet. The earliest recorded sighting of Uranus was in 1690 by John Flamsteed, but the object was catalogued as another star. On March 13, 1781 Uranus was sighted again by amateur astronomer William Herschel and thought to be a comet or nebulous star. In 1784, Jean-Dominique Cassini, director of the Paris Observatory and prominent professional astronomer, made the following comment:
In his charming book The Celestial Worlds Discover'd, posthumously published in 1696, most of the opening chapter celebrates all that was then known of planetary orbits, shapes, and sizes, as well as the planets' relative brightness and presumed rockiness. The book even includes foldout charts illustrating the structure of the solar system. God is absent from this discussion—even though a mere century earlier, before Newton's achievements, planetary orbits were supreme
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Swerdlow, N., & Neugebaur, O. (1984). Mathematical astronomy in copernicus's de revolutionibus. New York: Springer-Verlag.
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