A new planet has been recently discovered. The planet name
is Kepler 78b. This planet is outside of our solar system. Kepler 78b was
spotted by NASA’s Kepler Spacecraft. This planet has many similar
characteristics to the Earth. It is about the size of Earth. It has a density
of 0.2 cubic inches which is the same density as the Earth. Kepler 78b is made
up of the same materials like Earth. The outer layer of the planet is rocky and
the core is made out of iron. Kepler 78b also seems to orbit a star similar to
the sun. The distance between Kepler 78b is less than a million miles away from
its parent star; this makes the planet infernally hot. It is about 3,500 to
5,000 degrees Fahrenheit. Although it has many characteristics of the Earth,
the planet is inhabitable because it is so hot. There is one more question that
has been unanswered. How did Kelper 78b get where it is? One explanation is
that it was originally a gas giant and as the planet got closer to the star,
all the gases were stripped away only leaving the rocky core at the center.
There are a few more explanations, but all of them are mostly unlikely.
The
discovery of planets is very important to humankind. By learning about planets we
can find out if people are capable to live there or not. If we are capable to
live on another planet then we have a choice to move there if something bad
happens to the earth. In addition this kind of discovery proves that there are
a lot of planets that have similar characteristics to Earth that were not discovered
yet.
The
article was very educational. It was well written and included a lot of
details. Before reading this article I didn’t know that there were other
planets similar to Earth outside of the Solar System. The article should give additional
information on other planets that are also similar to Earth. I think that this
article was very interesting and I would love to learn more about other planets
that are similar to Earth.
Citation:
Chang, Kenneth. "Astronomers Find
Earthlike Planet, but It's Infernally Hot." Nytimes.com. N.p., 30
Oct. 2013. Web. 1 Nov. 2013.
I thought that this review was extremely interesting! Though it was pretty vague at some points and had me wondering what other theories there were that were 'mostly unlikely'. I feel like even more could have been written about this, but I liked how you gave a lot of numbers and specified just how it is like Earth, and just how hot it is. It's really interesting to see how there are planets like Earth elsewhere, and that it was thought to be a Gassy Giant but its proximity to the sun stripped it down only to its rocky core! It also makes me wonder how long it will take the planet to collide with its sun, and the affect it might have on the surrounding atmosphere! Very nice!
ReplyDeleteEmily,
ReplyDeleteI think you did a great job reviewing this article and very important topic of whether there are more habitable planets like Earth. You did a good job of explaining how similar Kepler 78b is to Earth. It made me realize that Earth is probably not the only planet with life. I liked how you gave specific examples of how it was similar, like the density and layering of the planet. On the other hand, you also explained the one huge difference well. The temperature, 3,500 degrees to 5,000 degrees Fahrenheit. I liked how you put emphasis on how important this discovery is to mankind. Not only because maybe we could somehow live there in the future, but also because if we found a planet this close in comparison to Earth, we could find one even closer characteristically to Earth, maybe even easily habitable. The discovery of this planet is completely new to me, I had no idea it was discovered. I was also unaware that a planet could be so much like Earth, but one difference makes it inhabitable. One other thing I didn't know was that gas giant could change into an almost terrestrial planet. Does that mean terrestrial planets could turn into gas giants? I think this is a very well written review, but one thing I would recommend would be to elaborate more on the other theories of how Kepler 78b got to where it is.
This article was hugely interesting because of it’s importance to all of humans on Earth. The review was well worded and explained and the significance of finding another planet similar to Earth was highlighted through the review. Another good aspect of the review was explaining the location of Kepler 78b, how it was discovered, and why it is inhabitable. It was interesting to know why humans would be unable to live there because even though for now it is too hot, with new technology being created all the time it is somewhat likely that there could be a way to ‘cool down’ Kepler 78b. The exact measurements of how far away the star it orbits is made me contrast it to earth and realize the grander scale of measurements in a because although 1 million miles seems like a giant amount of space to me in everyday life it is important to understand just how vast our universe is. The only improvement would have to be that the theories about Kepler 78b be slightly more specific (if possible) to give a better understanding.
ReplyDelete