\n<\/p>\n
Since the Kepler Space Telescope began its prowl for exoplanets in 2009, it has uncovered a strange pattern among these alien worlds: their orbits follow a consistent rhythm. If one planet in a system takes twice as long to orbit its star as the planet before it, for instance, then the next planet should take another two times as long, and so on. But a strange few planetary systems don\u2019t abide by this \u201cpeas-in-a-pod\u201d rule.<\/p>\n
During a January 7 presentation at the American Astronomical Society\u2019s 247th meeting in Phoenix, Federico Noguer, an undergraduate at Arizona State University (ASU), revealed one particularly curious exception to this trend. The star TOI-1873\u2014about 600 light-years from Earth\u2014hosts three large planets just a bit smaller than Neptune. The trio was discovered in data from the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS), and two of the planets were first noticed through a volunteer science project called Planet Hunters TESS.<\/p>\n
The observations show that the two innermost planets take about seven and 25 days to circle their host star, respectively, suggesting that the orbit of each planet in this system should be about 3.6 times as long as that of the last. It should follow, then, that the third planet passes by the host star once every 90 days or so. But between each of the three times TESS observed the third planet, a staggering 900 days had passed.<\/p>\n
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It well may be that TESS simply missed some of the planet\u2019s flybys. If so, it would likely have an orbit faster than 900 days but still no shorter than 128 days. \u201cRegardless, this is a weird spacing,\u201d says Molly Simon, an astronomer at ASU, who worked on the study.<\/p>\n
It\u2019ll take more careful observations to fully unravel this strange star system. The team has already measured the masses of the inner two planets and confirmed them as exoplanets, but the researchers still need to tackle that pesky outer planet. They\u2019re hoping to win time at ground-based facilities to zero in on the third planet\u2019s mysterious orbit.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m always thinking of what telescopes we can propose for,\u201d Noguer says. \u201cBut we\u2019re trying to do something very hard. Even if it\u2019s the shortest [possible] period, if there are clouds in the sky, then you have to wait another 128 days to try again.\u201d<\/p>\n
The results so far show the importance of crowdsourced science, says Courtney Dressing, an astronomer at University of California, Berkeley, who was not involved in the research. \u201cIt\u2019s always neat when members of the public find something that might be missed by the algorithms run by a science team,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n
Astronomers are curious about whether other planets maybe be looming in the star system, which may explain the large gap in orbits. \u201cThat\u2019s an important question when you look at systems that don\u2019t follow the peas-in-a-pod paradigm,\u201d adds Paul Robertson, an astronomer at the University of California, Irvine, who did not participate in the study. \u201cYou have to ask, \u2018Well, what happened?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
As they get all their observations in order, the scientists are working to model possible explanations for how this system came to be. Perhaps there are hidden planets, or maybe other bodies interacted with the three planets to string them into this puzzling arrangement. The team plans to submit a paper officially confirming the newly discovered solar system this summer.<\/p>\n
If you enjoyed this article, I\u2019d like to ask for your support. Scientific American<\/span> has served as an advocate for science and industry for 180 years, and right now may be the most critical moment in that two-century history.<\/p>\n I\u2019ve been a Scientific American<\/span> subscriber since I was 12 years old, and it helped shape the way I look at the world. SciAm <\/span>always educates and delights me, and inspires a sense of awe for our vast, beautiful universe. I hope it does that for you, too.<\/p>\n If you subscribe to Scientific American<\/span>, you help ensure that our coverage is centered on meaningful research and discovery; that we have the resources to report on the decisions that threaten labs across the U.S.; and that we support both budding and working scientists at a time when the value of science itself too often goes unrecognized.<\/p>\n In return, you get essential news, captivating podcasts, brilliant infographics, can’t-miss newsletters, must-watch videos, challenging games, and the science world’s best writing and reporting. You can even gift someone a subscription.<\/p>\n There has never been a more important time for us to stand up and show why science matters. I hope you\u2019ll support us in that mission.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Since the Kepler Space Telescope began its prowl for exoplanets in 2009, it has uncovered a strange pattern among these alien worlds: their orbits follow a consistent rhythm. If one planet in a system takes twice as long to orbit its star as the planet before it, for instance, then the next planet should take<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":41374,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[58],"tags":[7167,2579,12423,666,1887,392],"class_list":{"0":"post-41373","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-science","8":"tag-bizarre","9":"tag-breaks","10":"tag-exoplanet","11":"tag-rules","12":"tag-solar","13":"tag-system"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41373","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=41373"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41373\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/41374"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=41373"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=41373"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=41373"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}