PlutonianEmpire's Circumbinary Reporting Thread

[PlutonianEmpire]

Changed thread title, cuz I want this thread to be my official news thread regarding news and discoveries about circumbinary planets.

I totally like the idea, but could you change the first word to something that isn't so easily confused with the solar system body by the same name?
You just caused a rush of adrenaline in my gut at the possibility of this most recent post announcing the discovery of a sixth moon at Pluto, based on my reading of the title.

Heh, hadn't thought of that (much ), but yeah, makes sense.

EDIT: Done.

[PlutonianEmpire]

http://arxiv.org/abs/1210.7757

...planetesimal accretion can be inhibited even in the outer disk (4-10 AU) far from the central binary, a location previously thought to be a plausible starting point for the formation of circumbinary planets.

Blast it! A whole year of working on my story and preparing a Celestia universe for it down the drain!

[selden]

It's the initial formation which they think is inhibited. That wouldn't stop planets from from moving into that region later due to orbital effects. The large number of "strange" planetary orbital configurations which have been found makes it clear that there are enough planets around enough stars that every possible configuration exists somewhere. A configuration being unlikely means that there are very few of that particular type, not that there are none.

[PlutonianEmpire]

It's the initial formation which they think is inhibited. That wouldn't stop planets from from moving into that region later due to orbital effects. The large number of "strange" planetary orbital configurations which have been found makes it clear that there are enough planets around enough stars that every possible configuration exists somewhere. A configuration being unlikely means that there are very few of that particular type, not that there are none.

That's the problem.

What we're finding in space is, to me anyway, becoming more and more "strange", enough so that life as we know it is bordering on impossible. To me, it's just more evidence in support of the Rare Earth theory, if not the "Lonely Earth theory"*, which to me, seems to be extremely likely, regardless of the size of the universe and the number of objects in it.

Or, I just wear my heart on my sleeve too much. I'm a hopeless romantic. Especially if it involves sci-fi ideas (i.e., habitable circumbinaries).

*As far as I know, I just made it up out of the blue, but if such a theory actually exists in science debates as explicitly named, feel free to enlighten me.

[PlutonianEmpire]

http://astrobiology.com/2013/07/two-sun ... ility.html

An International Collaboration of FACom researchers and astronomers of the University of Texas (El Paso) and New Mexico State University have discovered a physical mechanism that could make binary stars more hospitable to habitable planets than single stars.

The discovery could imply a modification in the estimations of the number of planets potentially harboring life in the galaxy and in the future selection of targets for the search of life elsewhere.

The paper:

http://arxiv.org/abs/1307.4624

I read the paper, but I'm not sure how this might apply to my Delta Trianguli addon, but from the figures provided, I take it the components (1.09 Msun G0V / 0.75 Msun K3V / P=10 days SMA=0.11146 au) may likely have ended up with the forever young effect and potentially diminishing habitability? Or am I being too pessimistic, since I noted Kepler-47 was in the middle range?

[omega13a]

You could always change the masses and types of the two stars...

[PlutonianEmpire]

My first inclination was to disagree, on the basis of it being an existing real life star, but after thinking about, that might quite not be such a bad idea, considering most of the data I used for the way I have it set up in my installation of Celestia is derived from personal extrapolations and derivations from existing data from various sources. For example, I used the total mass and period to get the sma, which should really be approx. 0.106 au based on one source, making my current setup potentially inconsistent with existing records.

I did notice, that reducing the mass of the secondary would make it not too much different from Kepler-47, which was labelled as one of the more middle of the road or better systems for circumbinary habitability, in addition to making DEL Tri more consistent with the a=0.106 au p=10 d findings from some sources.

So, although red dwarfs and late K are my least favorite stars, this was a pretty cool suggestion! Thanks!

[omega13a]

Red or late orange dwarfs generate highly violent radiations lethal to life, even in a possible habitable zone (about distance)...

Well, It depends on a number of factors if I understand that paper correctly.

[omega13a]

I found this interesting paper for calculating the habitable zones around binary and multiple stars: http://arxiv.org/pdf/1401.0601v1.pdf
I sure wish the guy would share the source code because it might make my life easier when it comes to adding support for circumbinary systems to stargen...

[PlutonianEmpire]

I actually saw that. Pretty cool, indeed; but yeah, would've been nice to see the source code, not to mention the site is online only, which is a bit of a bummer. On the plus side, it revealed that a high mass system I made In stargen had a second Jovian in the habitable zone in addition to one that was already there.