Category Archives: planets

astronomy news, dwarf planets, planetary science, planets, Plutoid

Another Dwarf Planet in the Wings

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They’re Out There

See Explanation. Clicking on the picture will downloadThe known solar system continues to expand. While I was on vacation, astronomers gave a name and designation to an outer solar system world that’s roughly 3/4 the size of Pluto.  This plutoid (which is a subclass of dwarf planets), discovered in 2005, is now called Makemake (pronounced mah-kay mah-kay), or (136472) Makemake, if you’re sending a formal invitation for it to join the community of worlds. Mike Brown, the astronomer who discovered Makemake, has a great discussion about the name he selected for this world, which is a Kuiper Belt object. Essentially, he chose the  name of the god of fertility in the mythology of the South Pacific island of Rapa Nui at Easter Island.

We don’t really have a good image of Makemake, but my friend Robert Hurt at IPAC at Caltech, who does double duty as a scientist AND talented space artist, came up with this lovely artist’s conception of what the newest Plutoid might look like. It could have a moon, so Robert put one in.  We won’t know for sure until more detailed imaging and spectra can be done. It’s exciting to see more worlds being discovered “out there” on the frontier of the solar system!

astronomy, planets, star death, starbirth, stars

Standing on the Ashes of a Star

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Here’s Your July Assignment

A color image of Earth as seen from Apollo 17.

Take a hike. No, really. Go out for a hike somewhere and closely examine the rocks and soil you encounter. If you live near mountains, look at them and imagine them as they were when they were young. Then, think about where all this stuff came from. If you go back to almost first principles, you find out that what you’re seeing and hiking on is the leftovers of star formation. That’s because sometimes planets are what’s left after a star forms. And, in the case of our four inner planets, the leftovers became worlds we know and love.

The elements in those rocks, the ones that make up the plants and animals you see on yourhike, and you yourself, are all part of stuff that was a star–ashes that were recycled into the Sun and somehow made it into the soup of stuff that created Earth. Quite a cool thing to think about when you’re out hiking.