Huge New Planet May Be Lurking Beyond Pluto

[Fanghawk]

Huge New Planet May Be Lurking Beyond Pluto

//cdn.themis-media.com/media/global/images/library/deriv/1258/1258484.jpgAstronomers have found new evidence to suggest a undiscovered planet larger than Earth is in our solar system.

Planet or not, <a href=http://www.escapistmagazine.com/tag/view/pluto>Pluto is usually considered the boundary of our solar system before one moves into open space. That doesn't mean nothing's there, simply that <a href=http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/139488-MIT-Meteorites-Come-From-Planets-Study-Space>we shouldn't find worlds the size of Earth. But apparently we haven't accounted for "Planet Nine", an icy world creeping along well beyond Pluto. And while we can't see it, we're pretty sure it's huge - roughly five to ten times larger than Earth.

So why haven't we noticed Planet Nine before? Apparently it's so far away from the Sun's light that we haven't been able to observe it directly. Yet according to research published in the Astronomical Journal, the motion of nearby dwarf planets and objects implies it's out there, throwing everything off with its massive gravity.

Not that Planet Nine would be the solar system's biggest planet - current figures suggest it would be fifth, after Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune. In fact, astronomers have theorized Planet Nine used to be closer to the Sun, but was thrown into a more distant orbit by the gravity of Jupiter or Saturn. Today, Planet Nine's orbit is 20 times farther away than Neptune is to Earth. Its closest approach to the Sun occurs once every 10,000 years, and even then stays farther away than other known planets.

The most hilarious detail to me, however, was that this Astronomical Journal study set out to disprove the notion of another planet. What the authors found was more evidence that seemed to confirm a single planetary body was the cause of this gravity. "We thought [the] idea was crazy," astronomer Michael Brown said of a 2014 paper on the subject. "Until then, we didn't really believe our results ourselves. It just didn't make sense to us ... That was the real jaw-dropping moment, when it went from a cute little idea to something that might be for real."

By the way, this is the same Michael Brown infamous for removing Pluto's status as a planet. So it only feels natural that he may have identified an even larger body within our solar system. Meanwhile, telescopes are scouring the skies for visual confirmation of its existence. Hopefully we'll be able to learn more details of our distant neighbor soon.

Source: Washington Post

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[Kenjitsuka]

Talk of this (and planet VULCAN, btw) has been going on for ages.
I'll believe it when NASA announces it. We have the sensors now...

 

[NinjaDeathSlap]

Just how far does the gravitational pull of the Sun reach exactly, if there can possibly be a planet in orbit 20 times further away than Neptune (I don't even know if that's the furthest point, the closest, or some kind of mean average, though if that graph is too scale it looks like that might even just be its closest point of orbit.)? How far do you have to go until you are well and truly 'out'?

Also, just throwing this out there, but there's always the chance Planet 9 could be a Mass Relay... you never know.

 

[rcs619]

Talk of this (and planet VULCAN, btw) has been going on for ages.
I'll believe it when NASA announces it. We have the sensors now...

Detecting it is going to be the tough part. It's too close (relatively) for the Hubble to have a good shot, and probably far too cold for the WISE array to detect (it was made to find stars and brown dwarfs). So, it's definitely going to take some legwork to confirm the thing. They have the math though, and they're saying that they anticipate a proper discovery within 5 years, so they seem pretty confident.

Here's hoping though, it'd certainly be neat.

Just how far does the gravitational pull of the Sun reach exactly, if there can possibly be a planet in orbit 20 times further away than Neptune (I don't even know if that's the furthest point, the closest, or some kind of mean average, though if that graph is too scale it looks like that might even just be its closest point of orbit.)? How far do you have to go until you are well and truly 'out'?

Also, just throwing this out there, but there's always the chance Planet 9 could be a Mass Relay... you never know.

Pretty far. I believe some estimates have the Oort Cloud reaching between 1-2 lightyears in diameter. At that point those objects would only be loosely bound to the Sun, but they are still bound.

Sticking closer to home, there's also the dwarf-planet Sedna, which has an insanely elliptical orbit (and an orbital period of over 11,000 years. Below is an image of Sedna's orbit. The pink circle is Pluto's orbit.

Spoiler

Actually, the existence of Planet 9 could answer a few questions. Sedna's orbit for one. Apparently scientists have been theorizing for years that the gravitational pull of some large, distant planet could be why it's so weird. There's also long-period comets from the Oort Cloud too. Astronomers have noticed that they are coming into the inner-system at odd angles. Angles they shouldn't be achieving naturally. So, something out there had to have disturbed them, and a big, unknown planet was one theory.

 

[the December King]

I always imagined that Yuggoth would be a bigger, darker brother to Pluto.

 

[vallorn]

Just how far does the gravitational pull of the Sun reach exactly, if there can possibly be a planet in orbit 20 times further away than Neptune (I don't even know if that's the furthest point, the closest, or some kind of mean average, though if that graph is too scale it looks like that might even just be its closest point of orbit.)? How far do you have to go until you are well and truly 'out'?

Also, just throwing this out there, but there's always the chance Planet 9 could be a Mass Relay... you never know.

The gravitational pull of the sun extends an infinite distance from its center of mass. To keep things simple I will use Newtonian Physics for this explanation of why:

The force of Gravity from one object on another is equal to this: (G*m*M)/(r^2)
That is to say, the gravitational constant of the universe (G), times the mass of the first object (m), times the mass of the second object (M), divided by the square of the distance between their centers of mass.

This means that gravity follows the inverse square law, as distance doubles, the force of gravity decreases to 1/4 of its original value, or, R1= 1m F1= 1N >> R2= 2m F2= 1/4N

From this we can see that gravitational attraction exists between every object in the universe up until r = infinity where the equation roughly resolves to 0.

Now lets take a look at the equations for circular motion.

F(centripetal) = m*(w^2)*r
Where m= the mass of the moving object, w= the angular velocity (how many radians it moves per second where 360 degrees = 2pi radians), and r= the radius of the objects circular path.

We can see from basic logic that the centripetal force, the force pulling the object toward the center of its orbit, must be gravity, therefore:

m*(w^2)*r = (G*m*M)/(r^2)
Doing a little bit of algebra...
(m cancels on both sides) (w^2)*r = (G*M)/(r^2)
(divide both sides by r) (w^2) = (G*M)/(r^3)
(square root) w = ((G*M)/(r^3))^(1/2)
Now, what this says is that the mass of Planet Nine is irrelevant to its angular velocity in Newtonian Physics. Plugging in the numbers for G and the mass of the sun, and using its reported closes distance (200AU = 2.992*10^13m) gives us its fastest angular velocity (because this is its estimated closes distance) which comes to: 4.956*10^-21 radians per second, or, using the equation w=v/r, v=148 nanometers per second.

So this thing is way out there and not moving very fast at all, Good luck to the astronomers trying to find it!

 

[Chessrook44]

Planet Nine never stopped existing.

It's Pluto.

IT SHALL ALWAYS BE PLUTO. AND IF YOU DARE DISPUTE THAT I WILL SEND YOU THERE MYSELF. WITHOUT A SPACESUIT.

Sorry... still irked about this whole thing.

 

[Sampler]

Planet Nine never stopped existing.

It's Pluto.

IT SHALL ALWAYS BE PLUTO. AND IF YOU DARE DISPUTE THAT I WILL SEND YOU THERE MYSELF. WITHOUT A SPACESUIT.

Sorry... still irked about this whole thing.

You know Pluto's only 70% the diameter of our moon?[footnote]source: http://forums.theregister.co.uk/forum/1/2016/01/20/ninth_planet_search/[/footnote] It's time to let it go...

What I want to know is do either of the two accredited astronauts looking for it own a parrot named Rupert?[footnote]cookie for those whom get the reference[/footnote]

 

[default]

I don't get the whole PLUTO IS STILL A PLANET FUCK YOU shit. It still exists out there in the universe the same it has for billions of years, it just has a different throat-gargle vibration attached to it from the talking monkeys living on the third planet. And if it doesn't meet the designation of 'planet', then it isn't one. It doesn't diminish it or make it lesser, it's just got a different name.

But anyway, as a layman I really enjoy reading about astronomy and the wonderful, vast, beautiful events and bodies that we get glimpses of.

 

[MonkeyPunch]

What if this gravitational disturbance isn't from a planet we can't see... but rather from a black hole approaching us ever so slowly. Dun dun duuuun!

I'll just grab my tinfoil hat.

 

[RicoADF]

I don't get the whole PLUTO IS STILL A PLANET FUCK YOU shit. It still exists out there in the universe the same it has for billions of years, it just has a different throat-gargle vibration attached to it from the talking monkeys living on the third planet. And if it doesn't meet the designation of 'planet', then it isn't one. It doesn't diminish it or make it lesser, it's just got a different name.

But anyway, as a layman I really enjoy reading about astronomy and the wonderful, vast, beautiful events and bodies that we get glimpses of.

I especially don't get it as Pluto is still technically still classified a planet, only it's changed to 'dwarf planet'. I don't hear people winging about dwarf stars....

If it was downgraded to a moon or asteroid then I would understand the annoyance.

As for this theorised planet, I would so laugh if one of our probes which have left the system passed Pluto's orbit were to smack into it.

 

[Something Amyss]

Talk of this (and planet VULCAN, btw) has been going on for ages.
I'll believe it when NASA announces it. We have the sensors now...

Case in point, it's been less than six months since we last has a claim of new planets. Two of them.

 

[talker]

It doesn't matter if it's there or not. Pluto's orbit is the boundary, and there's no reason for us to ever go to 'Planet Nine', or any of these other copycats.
Pluto is a planet. You'll see. You'll ALL see!

PLUTO SHALL RISE AGAIN!

 

[Zontar]

I don't get the whole PLUTO IS STILL A PLANET FUCK YOU shit.

From what I gather I'd say it's nationalism. Pluto is the only planet in our system discovered in the US, all the other where discovered by simple observation (with Venus, Mars and Jupiter being the first planets discovered by simply assigning names to them as 'things that are not stars' by the Greeks, and the others by telescope over the centuries later) in Europe.

 

[Knight Captain Kerr]

I always imagined that Yuggoth would be a bigger, darker brother to Pluto.

You know if there actually is a planet in our solar system beyond Neptune (which it now seems possible that there might be) does anyone have a better name for it than Yuggoth?

We all know Majestic 12 have been keeping it secret all these years so we don't find out about the Mi-Go.

 

[Creator002]

Also, just throwing this out there, but there's always the chance Planet 9 could be a Mass Relay... you never know.

That's, uh, not really a comforting thought.
Then again, I'll be dead before the Reapers come. Bring it on!

 

[Mikeybb]

I hope someone manages to get this one called "Mondas" before anyone gets the reference.

 

[Hawki]

I hope someone manages to get this one called "Mondas" before anyone gets the reference.

Your comment beat me to it. I can only do one thing to your comment now...

DELETE. DELETE. DELETE.

 

[Mikeybb]

I hope someone manages to get this one called "Mondas" before anyone gets the reference.

Your comment beat me to it. I can only do one thing to your comment now...

DELETE. DELETE. DELETE.

NOO[small]OOO[/small]ooo[small]ooo[/small]...

 

[FirstNameLastName]

I don't get the whole PLUTO IS STILL A PLANET FUCK YOU shit.

From what I gather I'd say it's nationalism. Pluto is the only planet in our system discovered in the US, all the other where discovered by simple observation (with Venus, Mars and Jupiter being the first planets discovered by simply assigning names to them as 'things that are not stars' by the Greeks, and the others by telescope over the centuries later) in Europe.

I think you're attributing far more malice to it than is warranted. While there are a few people who are genuinely upset about Pluto not being classified a "planet", from what I've seen, the vast vast majority of it is entirely jovial, as given away by the absurd hyperbole and ALL CAPS RANTS that people clearly don't actually get emotional over.