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Uncategorized Wednesday, November 14th 2012 at 11:20 am

Lonely Planet: Researchers Discover Wandering World That Doesn’t Orbit A Star

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A team of astronomers at the University of Montreal has uncovered a cosmic first — a planet without a star to orbit. Though stargazing scientists have theorized the existence of planet-sized objects that don’t orbit any star for years, today’s announcement is the first confirmed sighting of a so-called “free-floating planet,” CFBDSIR2149, which meanders about a cluster of stars known as the AB Doradus Moving Group. While It wanders through this group of stars, though, it doesn’t call any of them home, seemingly preferring a life on the rails, not unlike some glorious space-hobo.

There have been other candidates for “free-floating planet” status in the past few years, but without solid data on the age and mass of these objects, astronomers have been unable to clearly define whether they are large planets or brown dwarf stars — small stars that, for whatever reason, fail to fully ignite. Working from data provided by the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope and the Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope, the University of Montreal team was finally able to pin down the pertinent measurements for CFBDSIR2149 and confirm that it is a planet, not a failed star.

The wandering planet is very young as far as planets go — between 50 and 120 million years old —  and is  a pretty big beast of a celestial body, with researchers estimating its mass to be somewhere between four and seven times the mass of Jupiter. Even at that enormous size, CFBDSIR2149 is still definitely a planet, falling well short of the 13 Jupiters worth of mass that would be necessary to classify it as a brown dwarf star.

The confirmation of this first wandering planet leaves researchers thinking that they might be more common than once thought, and the University of Montreal team is hopeful that they will find more objects like this in the future, as planets without home stars could offer valuable lessons on the ill-understood process of just how planets — and solar systems — take shape in the cosmos.

(via Eurekalert)

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  • pak256

    That’s no moon, it’s a space station

  • bfb

    If Pluto isn’t a planet, how does this get to be?

  • Anonymous

    In some future staging of the musical “Paint Your Wagon”, the lyrics of one song will be changed to “I Was Born Under A Wandering Planet”. Lee Marvin, thou shoulds’t be living at this hour.

  • http://www.facebook.com/Anonymous500 Killian Macnish

    Apparently, Pluto’s too “small” to be a planet.

  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Laurel-Kornfeld/587983188 Laurel Kornfeld

    Pluto IS a planet. The controversial IAU decision was made by only four percent of its members, most of whom are not planetary scientists, and it was opposed by hundreds of professional astronomers in a formal petition. The media has been remiss in not reporting the status of Pluto as the subject of an ongoing debate.

  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Laurel-Kornfeld/587983188 Laurel Kornfeld

    According to the equally legitimate geophysical planet definition, Pluto isn’t too small to be a planet because it is well beyond the threshold for an object to be rounded by its own gravity.

  • Jesse

    The other criteria for an object to be considered a planet is that it must clear its orbit of debris. Pluto hasn’t done this, and so cannot be a planet.

  • CMONSTA211

    Though the accretion is slower the larger the orbit, and the lifespan of the solar system obviously hasn’t been reached yet (and would vary depending on the star) so not sure about that particular argument

  • Anonymous

    Couldn’t prove its age. Really could guess, but so could I.

  • Feste

    The term “wandering planet” is redundant since “planet” comes from the greek “planetes” meaning “wanderer”: hence “wandering wanderer.” Funny too the statement, “The confirmation of this first wandering planet leaves researchers thinking that they might be more common than once thought.” That statement is nonsensical. It is like saying, “We found one single instance of an event that we postulated might occur rarely, therefore, it must happen more frequently than we supposed.” What?!?!? Non-scientific induction!

  • Dragontaco22221

    They are called planets because early astronomers noticed that a few of the “stars” didn’t move in the same direction like all of the other ones did. They are called wanderers because from earth’s perspective they wander when compared to the stars. I believe mars stops and goes backwards for a while, while venus makes a pentagram shape in the sky. A planet without a star is called a planemo. That term was created to avoid redundancy. B+ for effort!

  • Zhane

    Could it be… Sephiroth? .. Lol.