Summary
20th May 2011
Japanese astronomers claim to have found 'planets' which don't go round a star.
Writing in the magazine 'Nature' they say they have found ten Jupiter-sized objects which they could not connect to any solar system.
Reporter:
Neil Bowdler
Artist's impression of one of the 'floating planets'
Listen
Click to hear the report
Report
The researchers claim to have found ten dark gas giants floating at the heart of our Milky Way without any nearby star to illuminate them. Astronomers have long suspected such rogue planets existed, but this is the first evidence, and the Japanese team believe there could be as many out there as there are stars, a finding likely to shock many.
How they came into being is unclear. One theory is that they may be cast-outs, forgotten worlds ejected from infant solar systems by gravitational forces or interplanetary collisions.
Strictly speaking, the objects aren't even planets, as by definition planets orbit a star or the remains of one. But should the researchers have their calculations right, then strange dark orbs which look very much like planets are out there, far far from any shining star.
Neil Bowdler, 大象传媒 News
Listen
Click to hear the vocabulary
Vocabulary
- gas giants
large planets which don't have a solid surface
- rogue
unconventional, not normal
- came into being
were formed, created
- cast-outs
objects that have been thrown away
- ejected from
thrown out of
- gravitational forces
the natural attraction that pulls objects in space together
- interplanetary collisions
crashes between planets
- Strictly speaking
Being accurate
- the remains of
what is left of
- orbs
round, ball-shaped objects
