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Possible Ninth Planet (NOT Pluto!)

B.J.

B.J.

Rear Admiral
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http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2016...eptune-sized-planet-lurks-unseen-solar-system

A couple of astronomers have come up with some strong evidence that a Neptune-sized planet is out there past Pluto. It's way out there too, 7 times further than Neptune at its closest approach (~200AU), and could go out to ~600-1200AU at its furthest.

I know some people may want to call BS already, but seriously, read the article. It's long, but it's very interesting. What's really ironic is that one of the astronomers is Mike Brown, best known for "killing" Pluto.
“Killing Pluto was fun. Finding Sedna was scientifically interesting,” he says. “But this one, this is head and shoulders above everything else.”
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The article does also say that the search for this planet will take ~5 years between two teams, using the Subaru telescope in Hawaii.
 
This sounds like the search for Nemesis, now it's become something else. With all of the searches over the years for Earth-threats, the Cosmic Microwave Background, Alien Solar Systems ... evidence for such would've been suggested and confirmed years ago.
 
2takesfrakes said:
This sounds like the search for Nemesis, now it's become something else. With all of the searches over the years for Earth-threats, the Cosmic Microwave Background, Alien Solar Systems ... evidence for such would've been suggested and confirmed years ago.
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No, because:
a) space is huge
b) its orbit is tilted out of the solar system's plane and highly elliptical.

The article seems pretty serious so I'd put up our @iguana_tonante signal to hear what he thinks.
 
I tried discussing this on MSN comments below the article, but no takers on discussion. Good to see it here, as I find it interesting.

Anyone know if the Pull of the dwarf planets could be caused from force of solar gravity exerted in lesser amounts as per distance from the sun? basically, could this really be a "solar shield" from a moving star in the galaxy being weaker out that far and thus said interactions on the dwarfs being slowly pulled away on by being on the edge... sort of looking like a comet loosing bits matter. (except in that as a solar system) or a warp field scenario (minus the faster than light) with objects on the edge of the warp field have pull from diminishing field vs normal space
 
Bad news, turns out its Mondas:

Cybermen.jpg
 
ok just thought I'd give you an image on "solarshield" as if to show what I was trying to say. As much as the Earth is a starship... the Solar system is a starship in larger form. Outside our "afission" of solar force... is leaking toward a vacuum and generating a pull on rocks outside suns grasp... still, sun is strong to have captured them all or progressing to capture more masseous objects. At the point of loss of integrity of the star system's ability to retain celestial body, no object is "claimable" except by directional force with colliding trajectory
solarshield1r1.jpg

it is to be noted solar shield is not necessarily deflecting but canceling and reducing opposition to its own field... when you break orbit on a planet, you have to breach the planetary gravitational shield on the way to mars... when you break the solar gravitational shield you are outside the substantial affects of our solar systems pull. This is where most of Trek says: 1/4 impulse till we break solar orbit, then go to warp. (in fact there's a regulation about velocity in star fleet)
 
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http://www.cnn.com/2016/01/20/us/po...ninth-planet1140PMVODtopVideo&linkId=20534849

The orbit is thought to take 20,000 years to complete an entire transit around the Sun.

This would be a good planet to test and develop ideas on how time would be kept regarding age. Would you age based on a total number of days and nights? Or would your age be based on the locations that P9 would pass between such as two close together stars? How would someone measure their age on P9?
 
They'd measure it the same way you measure your age here on earth. You're confusing units of measure with time dilation. Again.
 
Dryson said:
The orbit is thought to take 20,000 years to complete an entire transit around the Sun.

This would be a good planet to test and develop ideas on how time would be kept regarding age. Would you age based on a total number of days and nights? Or would your age be based on the locations that P9 would pass between such as two close together stars? How would someone measure their age on P9?
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You can measure your age with a clock. The number of days and nights doesn't matter. Aging happens at the same absolute speed. It's only different relative to other places.

Stick to the topic. This is about finding a new planet. If you have questions regarding how time dilation works, make a new thread. Don't derail this one. I'm only asking once.
 
How long do you think it'll be before the Zachariah Sitchin supporters claim its NIbiru?
 
Just found out that Mike Brown grew up here in Huntsville! :D Also, his twitter handle is @plutokiller (HA!), and he has a rather interesting sense of humor about the whole thing. Here's one article he links that he describes as "Best. Planet. Nine. Article. Ever.": http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2016/01/scientists-discover-most-planet-y-planet-solar-system

He's also linked to his and Konstantin Batygin's paper on the subject, even though it isn't officially published yet: http://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/0004-6256/151/2/22
Lot of data and big words to sift through there!
 
I'll admit I didn't read much beyond than the abstract, but it sounds like a pretty promising idea. Certainly it is much more likely than the arrangement mentioned being random, and a Neptune-sized body would be difficult to spot. The existence of a large-ish celestial object is not something particularly extraordinary, so it is not a crazy explanation. My bet is that the planet is there.

It's yet to be detected/proven, other hypotheses that account for all of that may need to be explored, and I am reading some predictions the article makes are yet to be observed, but I still feel it's more likely that there's a planet than there isn't.

Strangely enough, that thing would be barely a planet. Article says the mass of the object is more than 10 m⊕ (Neptune is 17 m⊕), and would have a semimajor axis of around 700 AU. That means it's Margot Π discriminant would be somewhere above 10 / 720^(9/8) that of Earth's (8.1 × 10^2), or 2.5. You need more than 1 to be a planet, but that's a rough approximation, and doesn't even take eccentricity into account – the high eccentricity here would reduce the changes that the planet can clear its neighbourhood, as far as I understand.

So, if we are placing bets, mine is: It's there, it's not a planet, and uh-oh, there's going to be a large scale flamewar. ;)
 
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