Alien Worlds

2012, Science  -  11 min Leave a Comment
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This is a compilation of Space Rip videos explaining the nature of the worlds beyond our solar system.

The first video talks about a star named Fomalhaut, which supposedly has a planet orbiting around it.

Fomalhaut is much hotter than our sun and 15 times as bright. In fact, it's one of the brightest stars in our night sky. What makes it so curious is the large ring of gas that surrounds it. The ring is slightly off center from the location of the sun.

That suggests there's a gravitational presence, a planet, that's distorting its shape. With a coronagraph in place to block the star's light, Hubble zeroed in on the ring. Right there in the data, it turns out, was a bump, perhaps a planet.

Hubble photographed this planet a second time, two years later when it had progressed in its orbit. Based on the change in position, astronomers calculated that it takes about 872 Earth-years to complete an orbit.

The rest of the videos talk about the formation of the planets; how solar systems and planets evolve; portrait of Gliese 581; the beauty of stars being born; NASA debunking the wacky 2012 claims; exo-planets; etc.

Watch the full documentary now (playlist - 1 hour, 57 minutes)

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