Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="imhotep" data-source="post: 27029115" data-attributes="member: 562115">As mentioned in the previous post by [USER=577135]@Stimulus mind[/USER] Scientists believe they may have discovered the first known planet outside of our own galaxy. The "possible exoplanet" - which has been found in the spiral galaxy Messier 51, also known as the Whirlpool Galaxy - is 28 million light years away.It is thousands of times further than any other exoplanet previously found in the Milky Way. It was detected by the Chandra X-ray Observatory, a NASA space telescope that is 86,000 miles away from the Earth.The new discovery, which is "roughly the size of Saturn", has been listed under the name M51-1 and been hailed as a breakthrough in the hunt for distant planets. "We are trying to open up a whole new arena for finding other worlds by searching for planet candidates at X-ray wavelengths, a strategy that makes it possible to discover them in other galaxies," said Rosanne Di Stefano of the Center for Astrophysics, who led the study that was published in Nature Astronomy.Chandra detects X-ray emissions from very hot areas of the universe and the new result was based on transits, which happen when a planet passes in front of a star.</blockquote>

Top Bottom