TRAPPIST-1 system: 7 Earth-sized planets

[selden]

Whoa, selden you are a genius! Thanks!!!

Not really. This is one of the examples provided in the Celestia WikiBook at https://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Celestia/Reference_Frames#Sun-locked

how can I rotate a little bit the tidally locked planet? It's texture is not at the right spot...(I don't want to manipulate the texture).

One way to do it is to define a separate viewable object which is rotated by the appropriate amount and positioned relative to the one that's phase-locked to the primary.

For example, change the name of the original object from "b" to "b0" and reduce its size (so it'll be hidden), then define "b" relative to it with an appropriate MeridianAngle. There's an example of this on the WikiBook page linked above. A disadvantage of this method is that b's orbit is no longer drawn since it's in a fixed location.

Code: Select all

"b0" "TRAPPIST-1"
{
Class "planet"
Radius 1

EllipticalOrbit {
Period 0.004136538836 #1 year = 365.25 day
SemiMajorAxis 0.01111
Eccentricity 0.081
Inclination 89.65
}
}

Modify "b0" "Trappist-1"
{
BodyFrame {
    TwoVector {
        Center "Trappist-1/b0"
        Primary {
            Axis "z"
            RelativePosition { Target "Trappist-1" }
        }
        Secondary {
            Axis "x"
            RelativeVelocity { Target "Trappist-1" }
        }
    }
  }
}

"b" "TRAPPIST-1"
{
   Mass 0.85 #
Radius 6918.906 #earth 1 = 6371 km
Texture "amalthea.*"

  OrbitFrame { BodyFixed { Center "Trappist-1/b0" }}
  FixedPosition  [ 0 0 0 ]

  BodyFrame { BodyFixed { Center  "Trappist-1/b0" }}
  FixedRotation { MeridianAngle 25 }

}


[john71]

Thanks anyway, and you are a genius, because nobody helped me as much as you did in the last few months.

Anyway I made a PDF file from the book...

Celestia online book.pdf.zip

Added after 10 minutes 39 seconds:
TRAPPIST-1 is an exciting star system...not only for us....

http://forum.celestialmatters.org/viewtopic.php?f=17&t=828&start=45

It would be fantastic to make an accurate add-on for Celestia. I will try to make "original" surface, specular and bump textures for each planet in 8k resolution, but getting the orbital data right is a problem for me right now...

[selden]

Here's a revised use of the "dual planet" technique which does show an orbital path associated with the revised planet:
define the initial planet as Class "invisible" and use exactly the same orbit definition for the second, visible, planet.

Code: Select all

"b0" "TRAPPIST-1"
{

   Radius 1
   Class "invisible"

EllipticalOrbit {
Period 0.004136538836 #1 year = 365.25 day
SemiMajorAxis 0.01111
Eccentricity 0.081
Inclination 89.65
}
}

Modify "b0" "Trappist-1"
{
BodyFrame {
    TwoVector {
        Center "Trappist-1/b0"
        Primary {
            Axis "z"
            RelativePosition { Target "Trappist-1" }
        }
        Secondary {
            Axis "x"
            RelativeVelocity { Target "Trappist-1" }
        }
    }
  }
}

"b" "TRAPPIST-1"
{
   Mass 0.85 #
Radius 6918.906 #earth 1 = 6371 km
Texture "amalthea.*"

EllipticalOrbit {
Period 0.004136538836 #1 year = 365.25 day
SemiMajorAxis 0.01111
Eccentricity 0.081
Inclination 89.65
}

  BodyFrame { BodyFixed { Center  "Trappist-1/b0" }}
  FixedRotation { MeridianAngle 45 Inclination 45 }

}


[john71]

Selden, thank you very much, I will try it tomorrow!

Meantime I found another solution:

FixedRotation { Inclination -90 AscendingNode 90 }

This moves the texture to the right place...

3 new pictures:

With the star.png

Trappist1e-from orbit.jpg

Trappist1e-close.jpg

[john71]

TRAPPIST-1f, e, d, c, b, the first five planets (still working on them, just a preview):

Trappist1b.png

Trappist1c.png

Trappist1d.png

Trappist1e.png

Trappist1f.png

Added after 1 minute 16 seconds:
TRAPPIST-1g and TRAPPIST-1h:

Trappist1g.png

Trappist1h.png

[ajtribick]

I agree it is somewhat difficult to get the orbital elements right, particularly when most of the cases you are likely to come across are wrong. Nevertheless I do find it slightly surprising that almost no-one seems to check whether the transiting planets in their add-ons actually transit the star from the correct viewing direction.

If you don't want to do the transform, you could try a two vector frame with the first axis being the z-axis pointing towards the Sun, and the x-axis towards north in the equatorial system (but watch out for the correct interpretation of radial coordinates!). I prefer to do the transform to ecliptic coordinates (easier to do once you've converted from Euler angles to a representation of rotation that's easier to manipulate, e.g. quaternions) because reference frames don't work in .stc files and I like to be able to deal with binary stars properly.

[john71]

I reworked TRAPPIST-1g (I don't really understand NASA's depiction of this planet. If there are oceans and it is (maybe) habitable, then why are there clouds like on
Neptune?) I mean it is tidally locked, it must have large ice fields...and must have warmer oceans on one side. It must be similar to TRAPPIST-1f.

Trappist1gv2.png

Added after 16 minutes 54 seconds:
TRAPPIST-1d is also an interesting planet. Not habitable, but it has liquid water on it...maybe "seas"...a closeup picture:

Trappist1dv2.png

Reworked TRAPPIST-1e and f:

Trappist1ev2.png

Trappist1fv2.png

[john71]

TRAPPIST-1f with fused and mixed
a.) Enceladus surface
b.) Enceladus bump
c.) generated Earth-like surface
d.) real Earth bump
textures.
Enceladus texture source:
https://astrogeology.usgs.gov/search/map/Enceladus/Cassini/Enceladus_Cassini_mosaic_global_110m

TRAPPIST-1f-newbump.png

[john71]

OK, the last few pictures: TRAPPIST-1e (I decided to erase all ice fields from the surface) and TRAPPIST-1g, a green ice planet with some liquid water on it's surface (I used Europa bump map textures).

TRAPPIST-1ev2.png

TRAPPIST-1gv2.png

[symaski62]

https://arxiv.org/abs/1703.04166

36 pages

18.764 days
0.715 Earth radii
SemiMajorAxis 0.059
Epoch 2457662.55482

Code: Select all


"h" "TRAPPIST-1"
{
   Radius 4555  # radius of 0.715 Earth radii
   Mass 0.377359 # from mass-radius relationship

   Texture "asteroid.*"

   EllipticalOrbit {
      SemiMajorAxis 0.059 
      Period 0.05137303217 # 18.764 days
      Eccentricity 0

      Epoch 2457662.554482 # transit midpoint
      MeanAnomaly 90.000

      ArgOfPericenter 180.000 # unknown, 0 assumed
      Inclination 0.834
      AscendingNode 255.734 # unknown, using ecliptic
   }

   UniformRotation {
      Inclination 0.834 # to match orbit
      AscendingNode 255.734 # to match orbit
   }
}



[john71]

Thank you for the information!

[symaski62]

https://arxiv.org/abs/1704.02261

Plausible Compositions of the Seven TRAPPIST-1 Planets Using Long-term Dynamical Simulations

TRAPPIST-1 is a nearby ultra-cool dwarf that is host to a remarkable planetary system consisting of seven transiting planets.

Here we perform many thousands of N-body dynamical simulations with planet properties perturbed from the observed values and identify those that are stable for millions of years. This allows us to identify self-consistent orbital solutions that can be used in future studies. From our range of dynamical masses, we find that most of the planets are consistent with an Earth-like composition, where TRAPPIST-1f is likely to have a volatile-rich envelope.

[john71]

That's interesting. So it hasn't got a stable orbit and if it is not stable, there is a much less chance of habitability...

[symaski62]

https://arxiv.org/abs/1710.08761

Magma oceans and enhanced volcanism on TRAPPIST-1 planets due to induction heating

[Joey P.]

Could I please have a download link for the addon with the hires textures by john71 ?

Joey P.

[symaski62]

https://arxiv.org/abs/1801.02554

Early 2017 observations of TRAPPIST-1 with Spitzer

To further advance our understanding of these planets' compositions, energy budgets, and dynamics, we are carrying out an intensive photometric monitoring campaign of their transits with the Spitzer Space Telescope. In this context, we present 60 new transits of the TRAPPIST-1 planets observed with Spitzer/IRAC in February and March 2017.

pages 7 => Table 1. Updated system parameters: median values and 1-σ limits of the posterior PDFs derived from our global MCMC analysis

[symaski62]

https://arxiv.org/abs/1803.04543

Possible Bright Starspots on TRAPPIST-1

The M8V star TRAPPIST-1 hosts seven roughly Earth-sized planets and is a promising target for exoplanet characterization. Kepler/K2 Campaign 12 observations of TRAPPIST-1 in the optical show an apparent rotational modulation with a 3.3 day period

[roninwolf1981]

Anybody saved all of this as a zip or an rar file? This is far better than what was uploaded to Celestia Motherlode by SpaceAmoeba last year. I hope the full zip file becomes available.