Planet With 2 Suns

[mike Meehan]

Scientists have discovered a planet with two suns, one of which is a dwarf star:

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/us-astronomers-planet-two-suns-171449073.html

An interesting concept - I wonder how the varying gravitional pull would affect such a planet as this - I suspect it would be more geologically active and if say it was the earth there could be much more variation in climate and weather.

[Supercell]

Exciting discovery of a first "circumbinary planet". It appears to be in a stable orbit around two stars, which are in a very close binary system, that have a combined of just 90% that of our sun.

As the two stars are so close together you could just assume that they were one. Issues with climate and geology would arise if the planet orbited one of the stars in the binary. There wouldn't be any adverse gravitational pull as the stars and planets orbit a center of mass known as the barycenter.

Edited September 16, 2011 by Supercell

[NorthNorfolkWeather]

A slightly irreverent but factually accurate take on the same story

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/09/15/tatooine_planet_with_double_sun_discovered/

[A.J]

Very interesting discovery.....which begs the rather tongue-in-cheek question...I wonder if Luke Skywalker lives there??....lol

Worth noting to mods that there is a thread already open on exoplanets.....might be worth merging

http://forum.netweat...kepler-mission/

[Supercell]

Worth mentioning that there was an announcement earlier this week by ESO. Over 50 new exoplanets disocvered, including a "Super Earth" located just inside the habitable zone of the star.

http://www.space.com/12915-habitable-alien-planet-hd-85512b-super-earth.html

[Snowyowl9]

Star wars planet with 2 sun yes fiction is becoming fact.

[Crepuscular Ray]

Given that so far, half of all stellar systems seem to be doubles or multiples, is this really unexpected.

Anyway, if we're going to be picky, as far as sci-fi is concerned, Star Trek got there first: they had Vulcan as a planet in a double star system before Star Wars was dreamed of.