(ORDO NEWS) — In recent years, evidence has emerged suggesting that something large and possibly very dark may be lurking on the outskirts of the solar system.
This large dark being was named the Ninth Planet. a presence suggested by some of the particularly clustered orbits found around small objects in the solar system’s outer Kuiper belt.
Some scientists believe that something caused the gravitational disturbance that created these orbits.
Their calculations show that whatever it is, the mass of the object is between 5 and 10 Earth masses.
However, the outer solar system is very far away and objects in it are very difficult to detect. Planet Nine, if it exists, must orbit the Sun somewhere between 400 and 800 times further than the Earth is from the Sun.
So, although scientists have been looking for Planet Nine, it has eluded everyone so far.
One possible reason for this could be that Planet Nine is a dark object; like a black hole.
Not only would such a black hole not emit any light, it would be extremely small – it would be almost impossible to detect even if it could reflect light.
But astronomer Man Ho Chang of the Hong Kong Educational University in China thinks we can still find it.
“In this paper, we show that the probability of being captured by Planet Nine for large trans-Neptunian objects (TNOs) to form a satellite system in the scattered disk region (between the inner Oort Cloud and the Kuiper Belt) is high,” Chan writes in his paper.
“By adopting the reference model of Planet Nine, we show that the tidal effect can heat up satellites significantly, which can provide enough thermal radio flux for observations even if Planet Nine is a dark object.”
Almost every planet in the solar system has at least one moon. In fact, most have more than one. Mercury and Venus do not have moons, and the Earth is the only planet with one moon.
Some non-planetary bodies also have satellites. There is, of course, Pluto with its satellites. Some asteroids even have moons.
In the center and outside the solar system, satellites are very popular. Some of them, like the Earth’s Moon, could be formed from the material of the parent body itself.
On many other occasions, the planet’s gravity has caught passing rocks and held them like weird little goblins collecting rocks.
The place where Planet Nine was predicted to be should be ripe for the Moon…gathering: the region between the rock-filled Kuiper Belt and the rock-filled Oort Cloud.
This region, known as the scattered disk, should be filled with trans-Neptunian objects; these are mostly rocks whose orbit is at a greater average distance than that of Neptune.
Chiang calculated the probability that the supposed planet could have captured several satellites and found that it would be more unusual if it weren’t for.
According to his calculations, on average, an object with the mass of Planet Nine should capture 20 trans-Neptunian objects that are at least 140 kilometers (87 miles) across.
On their own, these pieces of icestone would be undetectable, but gravitational interaction with a more massive body could change this if the moon were large enough; say over 100 kilometers across.
Satellites captured by a planet usually have irregular elliptical orbits. This means that the gravitational stresses acting on the Moon change as it approaches and recedes from the planet, stretching it where the gravitational pull is strongest.
These ever-changing voltages heat the moon from within. . And the heat is dissipated in the form of thermal radiation. This should be detected as a radio signal; and that’s what we can look for right now,” says Chan.
“If P9 is a dark object and it has a satellite system, our proposal can observe potential heat signals emitted by satellites right now,” he said. writes.
“Thus, it would be a timely and effective method to confirm the Planet Nine hypothesis and test whether Planet Nine is a dark object or not.”
Well, it’s like a good thing to try.
—
Online:
Contact us: [email protected]
Our Standards, Terms of Use: Standard Terms And Conditions.