[meteorite-list] NASA's Kepler Mission Discovers Its First RockyPlanet

From: lebofsky at lpl.arizona.edu <lebofsky_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Mon, 10 Jan 2011 21:54:33 -0700 (MST)
Message-ID: <cb54bcd4087ad2d61bd77779aa80b372.squirrel_at_webmail.lpl.arizona.edu>

Hi Everyone:

An update. Geoff Marcy gave an invited talk this evening at the meeting I
am at (American Astronomical Society). The density of the "new" planet is
8.8 +/_ 2.5 g/cc (iron meteorites are 7-8). The large uncertainty (not bad
given the size of the object) implies that the planet can be anywhere from
a more compressed "Earth" (similar composition, but denser due to greater
mass) to an object made up of 75% iron (closer to Mercury in composition).

I find that interesting given that the star it orbits (and thus the star
system) is iron poor relative to the Sun. There is something new every
day!

Larry

> This is the top item on a list of Kepler "hits" waiting
> to be verified by ground-based telescopes. The list is
> roughly 700 "hits" long and we can expect a minimum
> of 500 to be confirmed.
>
> There are more hits in the data being teased out,
> so we can expect a flood of planets to be slowly confirmed
> and dribbled out. Planet-O-Rama!
>
>
> Sterling K. Webb
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Meteorites USA" <eric at meteoritesusa.com>
> To: "Meteorite-list" <meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com>
> Sent: Monday, January 10, 2011 1:28 PM
> Subject: [meteorite-list] NASA's Kepler Mission Discovers Its First
> RockyPlanet
>
>
>> http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.cfm?release=2011-007&cid=release_2011-007&msource=11007&tr=y&auid=7605855
>>
>> Not in the habitable zone, and 20 times closer to the Kepler 10 star
>> than Mercury is to our Sun, but it is 1.4 times the size of Earth
>> which is the smallest planet ever discovered outside our solar system.
>>
>> Way cool!
>>
>> Regards,
>> Eric
>>
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Received on Mon 10 Jan 2011 11:54:33 PM PST