# Planet Like 'Star Wars' Tatooine Discovered Orbiting 2 Suns



## Runvardh (May 17, 2011)

Planet Like 'Star Wars' Tatooine Discovered Orbiting 2 Suns | Kepler-16b Tatooine Planet Orbits Two Stars | NASA's Kepler Alien Planet Telescope | Space.com

More fun stuff as the look harder. If only there was enough money to launch the next generation of space telescopes.


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## Axiom (Sep 15, 2011)

Ooh, that's exciting news, the universe never ceases to amaze me.

All these recent planet discoveries certainly are promising.


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## Penemue (Feb 23, 2010)

As a nerd and as a sci-fi fan, i have to say that is pretty damn cool. It's a shame the space exploration has become to all intents and purposes extinct, though i suppose we can discover so much through space telescopes now that it isn't really viable to send humans into space.


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## MiriMiriAru (May 1, 2011)

It would be wonderful is there was a way we could see these planets as more than a gravitational anomaly on the surface of a star.


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## Runvardh (May 17, 2011)

Zombie Jesus said:


> It would be wonderful is there was a way we could see these planets as more than a gravitational anomaly on the surface of a star.


There's actually a few different methods of detection - some more direct than others. Hubble and Spitzer have both taken real pictures of planets (The most famous being Fomalhaut b), though they only come up as pin pricks of light. The Kepler telescope, that is out in a far orbit around Earth, uses the Transit method; this uses the change in light coming from a star to see if there are planets around it. The most popular is, however, radial velocity, which uses the doppler shift of a star to infer its movement and use that to work out the mass of what may be causing it. There are a few other methods, but they're less popular.


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## angularvelocity (Jun 15, 2009)

Yay!!! I can't wait till they find Endor!!!! I've always wanted to pinch the cheeks of an Ewok :O


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## Runvardh (May 17, 2011)

avalanche183 said:


> Yay!!! I can't wait till they find Endor!!!! I've always wanted to pinch the cheeks of an Ewok :O


They're possible, and a few gas giants have been found relatively close to the habitable zone of their stars. We just don't have the setup yet to detect their moons.


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## dalsgaard (Aug 14, 2010)

And only 200 light years away! That's pretty darn close.


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## Ubuntu (Jun 17, 2011)

I read about this the other day, it's fascinating.


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## MachinegunDojo (Dec 27, 2009)

A planet like Corusant would be was more awesome. "City Planet found!"

Too bad the planet isn't actually Tatooine like, it's probably more like a Jupiter type planet, but perhaps a nice habitable moon or two? Imagine that kind of sky? Double suns and a beautiful gas giant on the horizon. Hrm... actually that kinda sounds like the planet in Pitch Black... eek.


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## Runvardh (May 17, 2011)

MachinegunDojo said:


> A planet like Corusant would be was more awesome. "City Planet found!"
> 
> Too bad the planet isn't actually Tatooine like, it's probably more like a Jupiter type planet, but perhaps a nice habitable moon or two? Imagine that kind of sky? Double suns and a beautiful gas giant on the horizon. Hrm... actually that kinda sounds like the planet in Pitch Black... eek.


It's not even in the habitable zone, a moon around this planet would be rather frosty or freeze dried. Something like Mars, though maybe with a slightly thicker atmosphere due to the giant's protective magnetosphere.


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## MachinegunDojo (Dec 27, 2009)

I preferr to think of the habitable zone as more of a guideline than a rule.


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## Runvardh (May 17, 2011)

MachinegunDojo said:


> I preferr to think of the habitable zone as more of a guideline than a rule.


Eh, it all depends on what you are regarding as habitable since the size and luminosity of the star along with the distance the planet is from the star need to be taken into account to start with. Then there's the buffer you get from certain thicknesses of atmosphere and water content. On the mission website there is a list of planets they have found, and Kepler-16(AB)b comes up as having an equilibrium temperature of 170 - 200 K, while Earth sits around 255 K. Also, the Sun comes in at having a temperature of 5780 K, while Kepler-16A comes in at 4450 K. 

Of course one could argue that since they don't have a temperature reading for Kepler-16B that the extra star may help boost the temperature. Problem is, that other star is regularly eclipsed, rendering mute its contribution at that time; as well as eclipsing A, which, as a red dwarf, reduces the amount of light being contributed.

Don't worry, they have several candidates that are even closer to our temperature which are still waiting to be confirmed.


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