Thursday, January 21, 2010

The 5 Extrasolar Planets


The closest planet to 55 Cancri has about the same mass as Uranus and is located 5.6 million km (3.5 million miles) away from the star. It orbits the star in slightly less than 3 days.

The second planet is 17.9 million km (11.2 million miles) away from the star. It has about the same mass as Jupiter . It completes one orbit every 14.7 days.

The third planet from 55 Cancri is 35.9 million km (22.3 million miles) away. Its mass is about the same as Saturn's. It makes one complete orbit around the star every 44 days.

The fourth planet is 116.7 million km (72.5 million miles) from the star. This distance is similar to the distance that Earth is from our Sun (149.6 million km or 93 million miles). This planet's distance from 55 Cancri places it in the habitable zone - a zone in which it is likely that the temperature would permit the presence of liquid water. Scientists believe that liquid water is a necessary component to support the development of life. Astronomers believe that the planet may be similar to Saturn in composition and appearance, but only about half the size. It orbits the star every 260 days.

The fifth and most distant planet from 55 Cancri is 867.6 million km (539.1 million miles) from the star. It is a large planet with four times the mass of Jupiter (the largest planet in our solar system). The fifth planet completes one orbit every 14 Earth years.

Astronomers have only found five planets orbiting 55 Cancri so far, but there may be more planets that they haven't yet detected. So far, all of the planets found orbiting the star are large. Smaller planets would be harder for astronomers to detect, which means astronomers may not have found them yet.

Source: www.outerspaceplanet.com

No comments:

Post a Comment