Scientists have confirmed the existence of four small, rocky planets revolving around the star of Barnard – the second nearest star system for the Earth – using a special tool on the powerful Gemini North Telescope in Hawaii. Only six light-year away from us, all worlds are very hot to support life as we know.
This discovery is particularly exciting, Explained Ritvik Basant, which Ph.D. A writer on a letter about student and new discovery at the University of Chicago. This is because he said, Barnard’s star is essentially our cosmic neighbor, yet we do not know much about it.
There have been many claims of exoplanets While dating all the way in the 1960s, revolving the star of Bernard. Barnard’s star is one red DwarfAlso known as an M-Dwarf, and is noticeable for the fastest appropriate speed in terms of the speed that appears in the night sky of any star discovered so far.
Recently, in 2024, astronomers claimed using Espresso Spectrograph on very large binoculars in Chile. Detect a planetAnd proof for another three. Now, a team led by Jacob Bean and Besant at the University of Chicago has confirmed the existence of all four planets beyond doubt.
“The proximity of the star of Barnard allowed us to inspect it even during the nights of bad weather, as its brightness made it accessible even in subptimal conditions. This enabled us to collect more data, eventually leading to the detection of these very low-dominant planets,” Basant told Space.com.
A major device used in the team’s comments was Maroon-X spectrometer, a visiting instrument on Mithun North. The maroon-X measures the “radial veg”-the front and back of the Barnard’s star because it revolves around the center of the mass shared between its and four revolving planets. They are much less larger than everyone EarthIn fact, they detect some at least large -scale exoplanets.
The inner planet in the system is the planet D (planets are designated in order to search, not distance from the star), which is just 26% of the mass. Earth And every 2.34 days at a distance of 1.7 million miles (2.8 million kilometers/0.0188) AstronomyThe next planet is B: The planet was first identified in Espresso data in 2024. The planet has 30% mass of Earth, and revolves around his star every 3.15 days at a distance of 2.13 million miles (3.4 million kilometers/0.0229 AU).
Planette is a heavyweight of a bunch, with 33.5% of the Earth. It revolves around the star of Barnard at a distance of 2.55 million miles (4.1 million kilometers/0.0274 AU) and its orbital duration is 4.12 days.
The first three planets were confirmed only using maroon-X comments. To confirm the fourth planet, E, maroon-X data was to be combined with the measurement of Espresso to reveal a planet with just 19% of the Earth’s mass, revolving around the star of Barnard every 6.74 days to a distance of 3.56 million miles (5.7 million kilometers/0.0381 AU).
These worlds are incredibly compact in terms of distance from each other, with only 372,820 miles (600,000 km) between the planets and 434,960 miles (700,000 km) between 434,960 miles between B and B and C. For comparison, the distance between the Earth and us moon There is only 238,600 miles (384,000 km). Imagine having a planet at our door at that distance!
Nevertheless, it is how things are arranged around the star of Barnard.
A single starrer for contrast, NASA Parker Solar InvestigationWhich actually dives into the solar corona, gets closer to our surface as 3.9 million miles (6.2 million kilometers) SunAll the four planets around the star of Barnard can easily fit the classes of Parker’s solar examination of Parker. And, to carry forward the opposite of us Solar system And the planetary system of the star of Barnard, the closest planet of the Sun in our solar system, MercuryThere is an average distance of 36 million miles (58 million kilometers) between itself and the Sun.
Small separation among the planets around the Barnard star also takes into account another system of the world around a red dwarf, Trappist-1Where seven planets are packed within 5.75 million miles (9.267 million kilometers) of their central star.
However, a red dwarf like Barnard’s star is very different from our sun. This is just 16% of our Sun’s mass, and 19% is its diameter. For example, its planetary system is reduced. Red dwarfs can also be very unstable, the clouds of charged particles and flarers of radiation more often than our sun, which can take away the world around their atmosphere. However, red dwarf activity decreases with age, and Barnard’s star system is about 10 billion years old.
He said, none of the planets found so far will be living for life as we know it anyway, because they are very close and very hot. Instead, Habitat The star of Barnard will come out with the world, with the orbital period between 10 and 42 days. So far, no planet has been found away from the star.
“With the current dataset, we confidently rule any planet over a large scale than the mass of the Earth for more than 40 to 60%, which is near the inner and outer edges of the habitable field,” Sbasant said .. “Also, we can leave the presence of Earth-Drain planets for a few years.
The Maroon-X was able to collect 112 radial velocity measurements of the star of Barnard in a period of 2021-2023. Meanwhile, Espresso has recorded 149 radial velocity measurements of fleet-legs but low stars. This is not enough to completely control the possibility of any more small planets that may be in the habitable field.
“We also have additional data from 2024 which were not used in this discovery,” Basant said. “If I had to choose a number, I would guess that 50 and data points would be ideal for getting the best sensitivity with current devices.”
Maroon-X is specifically designed to measure the radial velocity of red dwarf systems. The red dwarf is focused two times. One reason is that they are the most populous stars Galaxy And make a majority of the closest stars for us. Second, their small public makes it easy to detect Wobbles in their movements due to the Earth -shaped rocky planets. Mithun is placed on an eight-meter class telescope like North, and is capable of viewing in a near-concentration, where red dwarfs of Baranard are bright, Maroon-X is fully placed to search for these scale-down planetary systems.
“It was possible due to a combination of search factors,” Basant said. “If I had to choose one, it would be unprecedented accuracy of the next generation equipment like Maroon-X and Espresso.”
Unfortunately, four planets of Barnard’s star do not transit in front of their star, or do not pass. This means that we cannot observe secondary eclipses (where the planets walk behind their stars, allowing us to reduce the stars with the joint light of the stars and planets, left only with the light of the planets) or transit spectroscopy (where the starlight is filtered through the paralysis, if they have one, if they have one, then the molecule can reveal.
However, “These planets do not have transit, their thermal emissions can be studied. James Web Space Telescope)However it is challenging, “Basant says.
Meanwhile, spring, bean and his team ordered to be in search of more planets, revolving around the star of Barnard. After all, we are practically neighbors – and it is about the time that we got and this planetary system came to know at the next door.
Conclusions were published on 11 March The astrophizical journal letters,
