Just a few months ago, people around the nation were donning silly-looking glasses in hopes of glimpsing an exciting extra-terrestrial phenomenon — a total eclipse of the sun.
In fact, my beloved arranged our summer vacation plans so that we would be in a good location for viewing with some of our extended family. It was a lot of trouble, but as our oldest daughter put it: “It was worth it just to see Dad’s face!”
We could say the same thing about space exploration in general — it is a lot trouble, but it definitely seems worth it. There have been tragedies and, sadly, even lives lost, but the exciting discoveries keep coming and people are determined to explore the stars.
Authors Michael Summers and James Trefil, both scientists at George Mason University, reveal some of the newest space discoveries in their book, “Exoplanets: Diamond Worlds, Super Earths, Pulsar Planets, and the New Search For Life Beyond Our Solar System.”
In 2009, NASA launched the Kepler satellite into orbit, named after German astronomer Johannes Kepler (1571-1630). The authors explain the science of detecting planets, which are harder to notice than stars because they merely reflect light rather than producing their own light.
Kepler’s telescope is oriented toward the constellation Cygnus, and monitors changes in detected light; if luminosity decreases, there may be something of note, a “Kepler object of interest.” A long process ensues to determine whether the change is due to a planet. (NASA’s mission webpage has a great animation showing how Kepler detects exoplanets at https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/kepler/main/index.html.)
Summers and Trefil explain current standards for space exploration, the definition of planets, and describe some of the most notable new planets discovered far outside our solar system. On a side note, if you took issue with the reclassification of Pluto from a planet to a dwarf planet a few years ago, you may be interested in the authors' explanation as to why it was important for the International Astronomical Union to downgrade Pluto’s status.
So, what exactly are the “diamond planets” mentioned in the title? “Diamond planets,” the authors write, “are made of pure carbon, with diamond mantles and cores of liquid diamond, a material unknown on Earth.”
Excuse me. I need a moment.
Okay, I’m breathing again. Continuing on: there are also Styrofoam planets — “planets so light we cannot figure out why they don’t collapse under their own gravity — ” and “multi-star worlds, which circle up to four stars, systems that were supposed to be dynamically impossible.”
The Styrofoam planets sound like something at the bottom of the cosmic wastebasket mixed up with the paper napkins and muffin wrappers, but if anybody goes to the diamond planet, please bring me some souvenirs.
Readers of popular science will enjoy this quite accessible book reporting back on the newest findings from of space.
Stop by Carlsbad Public Library to check it out.
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