SIGNS IN THE HEAVENS: More Planet X / Nibiru Memes - Giant FREE-FLOATING Exoplanet Without A Parent Star Is One Of The CLOSEST Such "ROGUE" Worlds To Earth Yet Seen; Within Relatively Close Proximity To The Sun; 4 To 8 Times More Massive Than Jupiter! [VIDEO]

The newfound rogue planet 2MASS J1119–1137 belongs in the youngest group of stars in the solar neighborhood, known as the TW Hydrae association, which contains
about 2 dozen 10 million-year-old stars, all moving together through space. David Rodriguez, Jacqueline Faherty, Jonathan Gagne and Stanimir Metchev 

April 25, 2016 - SPACE -  A huge, newly discovered alien planet that zooms through space without a parent star is one of the closest such "rogue" worlds to Earth yet seen, astronomers say.

The exoplanet, known as 2MASS J1119–1137, is four to eight times more massive than Jupiter and lies about 95 light-years from Earth at the moment, a new study reports.

The newfound world is only slightly less bright than the giant rogue planet PSO J318.5−22, which was first spotted in 2013 and is located about 80 light-years from Earth's solar system, researchers said.

Kendra Kellogg, a graduate student at Western University in Ontario, Canada, and her colleagues detected, confirmed and characterized 2MASS J1119–1137 using NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer satellite and the Gemini South and Baade telescopes, both of which are in Chile.


WATCH: Astronomy team discovers free-floating, planet-like objects within relatively close proximity to the Sun.

The observations by these instruments allowed the researchers to determine that 2MASS J1119–1137, while flying freely, is associated with TW Hydrae, a group of about two dozen stars that are the youngest in the sun's neighborhood.

The TW Hydrae stars — and 2MASS J1119–1137 as well — are just 10 million years old, study team members said. (For perspective, Earth's sun is nearly 4.6 billion years old, and the Big Bang that created the universe occurred about 13.8 billion years ago.)

PSO J318.5−22 is just slightly older than 2MASS J1119–1137, having been born about 23 million years ago, researchers said.

Such rogue worlds may have formed around host stars, and then been booted out into space by gravitational interactions with neighboring planets in their natal systems, researchers say. Whatever their origins, they are ripe targets for further study; in our Milky Way galaxy, rogue planets actually may outnumber "normal" worlds bound to parent stars.

"Discovering free-floating planet analogs like 2MASS J1119–1137 and PSO J318.5−22 offers a great opportunity to study the nature of giant planets outside the solar system," Kellogg said in statement.

Rogues are "much easier to scrutinize than planets orbiting around other stars," she added. "Objects like 2MASS J1119–1137 are drifting in space all alone, and our observations are not overwhelmed by the brightness of a host star next door."

The new study will be published in The Astrophysical Journal Letters.


- SPACE.

 

SIGNS IN THE HEAVENS: More Planet X / Nibiru Memes - NASA Discovers FREE-FLOATING PLANET-SIZED OBJECT In The MILKY WAY GALAXY; The RED GIANT Is Believed To Be About 5 TO 10 TIMES THE MASS OF JUPITER!

 NASA/JPL Caltech

April 24, 2016 - SPACE - In 2011, astronomers reported our galaxy is likely filled with roaming planets not attached to a host star, and these worlds may in fact outnumber stars in the Milky Way.

Scientists have debated over whether these objects are true planets, or light stars known as brown dwarfs. Brown dwarfs form just like stars but don't have the mass to spark nuclear fusion at their cores. In a new study published by The Astrophysical Journal, scientists identified one of these objects that may give answers to where these roaming objects came from.
Discovering objects throughout the galaxy

Scientists used information from NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) to identify the roaming, planetary-mass object inside a young star family, known as the TW Hydrae association. The newly found object, dubbed WISEA J114724.10-204021.3, or simply WISEA 1147, is believed to be between about 5 to 10 times the mass of Jupiter.

Since the object was discovered to be an affiliate the TW Hydrae group of very young stars, astronomers recognize that it is relatively young, around 10 million years old. Also, because planets need a minimum of 10 million years to develop, and even longer to get kicked out of a solar system, WISEA 1147 is probably a brown dwarf, the study team said.

"With continued monitoring, it may be possible to trace the history of WISEA 1147 to confirm whether or not it formed in isolation," study author Adam Schneider of the University of Toledo in Ohio, said in a NASA news release.

The study team said tracking the origins of free-floating objects and figuring out if they are planets or brown dwarfs is a struggle because they are so isolated.

A sky map taken by NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, or WISE, shows the location of the TW Hydrae family, or association, of stars, which lies about
175 light-years from Earth and is centered in the Hydra constellation. The stars are thought to have formed together around 10 million years ago.
NASA/JPL Caltech

"We are at the beginning of what will become a hot field – trying to determine the nature of the free-floating population and how many are planets versus brown dwarfs," said co-author Davy Kirkpatrick of NASA's Infrared Processing and Analysis Center (IPAC) at the CalTech.

One method to detect close roaming objects is movement in relation to other stars over time. The closer an object, the more it will seem to move against a background of more remote stars. By examining information from both sky surveys taken approximately 10 years apart, closer items jump out.

The brown dwarf WISEA 1147 was brilliantly red in survey pictures where the color red was assigned to longer infrared wavelengths, meaning that it's dusty and young.

"The features on this one screamed out, 'I'm a young brown dwarf,'" Schneider said.

After further evaluation, the astronomers discovered that this object is associated with the TW Hydrae group, which is around 150 light-years from Earth and just approximately 10 million years old. With an approximate mass between five and 10 times that of Jupiter, WISEA 1147 is one of the youngest and lightest brown dwarfs ever discovered. - Red Orbit.