Astronomers Discover 2 Shortcuts for Locating Earth-Like Planets
Stars orbited by planets are a little bit different than other stars, and scientists can use that to quickly home in on new planets.A young star with planets forming, illustrated here, may retain chemical clues about the worlds that surround it. ESO/L. Calçada |
A team led by astronomer Garik Israelian of the European Southern Observatory recently examined nearly 500 stars, including 86 with planets, and found that most of the planet-bearing stars contained very little lithium, a trait they share with our sun. Astronomers had previously regarded our sun as peculiar for its dearth of lithium. The element leaves a clear signal in the light of a star, so Israelian’s results provide an efficient way to sort through large numbers of stars and decide which ones to focus on for the more detailed studies needed to find planets. “If you have 50 candidates, you can immediately pick out the best,” he says.
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