1 00:00:01,920 --> 00:00:04,320 Speaker 1: Welcome to brain Stuff, a production of I Heart Radio. 2 00:00:06,280 --> 00:00:10,560 Speaker 1: Hey brain Stuff Lauren bol Obam here for those interested 3 00:00:10,600 --> 00:00:14,480 Speaker 1: in space science or even science fiction. Astronomers have been 4 00:00:14,520 --> 00:00:18,079 Speaker 1: full of fascinating news in the past few years. As 5 00:00:18,120 --> 00:00:21,840 Speaker 1: technology improves, researchers have been able to discover even more 6 00:00:21,880 --> 00:00:25,720 Speaker 1: celestial objects than we ever imagined, from comets and asteroids 7 00:00:25,760 --> 00:00:28,920 Speaker 1: zipping through our Solar System to dark matter and planets 8 00:00:29,040 --> 00:00:34,640 Speaker 1: orbiting distant stars. Now we have evidence of planets far 9 00:00:34,720 --> 00:00:38,280 Speaker 1: beyond those we've ever discovered before. But all the planets 10 00:00:38,320 --> 00:00:41,199 Speaker 1: we found through our advanced technology have been within our 11 00:00:41,240 --> 00:00:45,760 Speaker 1: own Milky Way Galaxy until now. That is. In a 12 00:00:45,800 --> 00:00:49,840 Speaker 1: paper published in October one in the journal Nature Astronomy, 13 00:00:49,880 --> 00:00:52,960 Speaker 1: a team of astronomers and astrophysicists has put forth a 14 00:00:53,000 --> 00:00:56,320 Speaker 1: new planetary candidate farther away than we've ever seen before. 15 00:00:57,200 --> 00:01:00,400 Speaker 1: It's called Catcheley M fifty one U L S one 16 00:01:00,480 --> 00:01:04,200 Speaker 1: B and is located in Messier fifty one, also called 17 00:01:04,280 --> 00:01:08,759 Speaker 1: the Whirlpool Galaxy. While humans might never see or even 18 00:01:08,760 --> 00:01:12,880 Speaker 1: confirm the existence of this potential planet, even its theoretical 19 00:01:12,920 --> 00:01:15,560 Speaker 1: reality paves the way for more discoveries and the deep 20 00:01:15,600 --> 00:01:21,440 Speaker 1: reaches of space beyond anything yet discovered. So let's talk 21 00:01:21,480 --> 00:01:25,840 Speaker 1: about how we find planets. Four decades researchers have used 22 00:01:25,920 --> 00:01:29,200 Speaker 1: data from Earth based and orbital telescopes to find planets 23 00:01:29,200 --> 00:01:34,280 Speaker 1: beyond those in our Solar system, called exoplanets. Typically, researchers 24 00:01:34,360 --> 00:01:36,880 Speaker 1: look for a transit event, which is when the planet's 25 00:01:36,920 --> 00:01:39,679 Speaker 1: orbit takes it in front of its star. From our perspective, 26 00:01:40,360 --> 00:01:43,520 Speaker 1: transits occur in our Solar system too. You might recall 27 00:01:43,560 --> 00:01:45,760 Speaker 1: one of the most recent transits that occurred in twenty 28 00:01:45,920 --> 00:01:48,840 Speaker 1: nineteen when tiny Mercury passed in front of the Sun. 29 00:01:50,360 --> 00:01:52,840 Speaker 1: Depending on the size of the planet relative to the star, 30 00:01:53,240 --> 00:01:56,280 Speaker 1: a transit event will cause the star's brightness too dim, 31 00:01:56,320 --> 00:01:59,240 Speaker 1: even when the star doesn't emit light along the visible wavelength. 32 00:02:00,000 --> 00:02:02,920 Speaker 1: That's why the Chandra X ray observatory was used to 33 00:02:02,920 --> 00:02:08,560 Speaker 1: discover this new planetary candidate. In many cases, researchers are 34 00:02:08,600 --> 00:02:11,120 Speaker 1: able to observe the star dimming and surmise that a 35 00:02:11,160 --> 00:02:14,560 Speaker 1: planet must be orbiting that star or stars, as there 36 00:02:14,560 --> 00:02:20,320 Speaker 1: are circumbinary planets that orbit two stars. These planetary candidates 37 00:02:20,320 --> 00:02:22,880 Speaker 1: are put forward to the scientific community to verify with 38 00:02:22,919 --> 00:02:26,040 Speaker 1: additional data, and have resulted in more than four thousand 39 00:02:26,120 --> 00:02:31,040 Speaker 1: confirmed exoplanets. Up until this point, though every proposed exo 40 00:02:31,040 --> 00:02:33,600 Speaker 1: planet has been located within a small region of our 41 00:02:33,639 --> 00:02:38,000 Speaker 1: own galaxy, the Milky Way. What makes this new paper 42 00:02:38,040 --> 00:02:40,880 Speaker 1: compelling is the proposal that the researchers have a planetary 43 00:02:40,919 --> 00:02:44,600 Speaker 1: candidate outside the Milky Way. Way outside the Milky Way. 44 00:02:44,840 --> 00:02:47,680 Speaker 1: According to their research, the potential planet is an estimated 45 00:02:47,760 --> 00:02:51,120 Speaker 1: twenty million light years from Earth. They also proposed a 46 00:02:51,160 --> 00:02:56,240 Speaker 1: new term for such planets, extra planets. The researchers chose 47 00:02:56,240 --> 00:02:59,800 Speaker 1: to look outside our galactic neighborhood for two reasons. For 48 00:03:00,280 --> 00:03:03,359 Speaker 1: there's a better probability of discovering a planetary candidate using 49 00:03:03,360 --> 00:03:06,400 Speaker 1: an X ray transit technique, since the binary stars that 50 00:03:06,440 --> 00:03:09,799 Speaker 1: omit X rays are physically smaller and thus more likely 51 00:03:09,840 --> 00:03:12,520 Speaker 1: to be fully obscured when one of their planets transits 52 00:03:12,520 --> 00:03:17,160 Speaker 1: across them. The second reason was practical. The team had 53 00:03:17,200 --> 00:03:19,960 Speaker 1: access to use the Chandra X ray observatory at a 54 00:03:20,000 --> 00:03:22,520 Speaker 1: time when the observatory was pointed at an area of 55 00:03:22,560 --> 00:03:27,240 Speaker 1: space where there were lots of data points for the article. 56 00:03:27,280 --> 00:03:29,400 Speaker 1: This episode is based on how Stuff Work spoke with 57 00:03:29,480 --> 00:03:32,680 Speaker 1: Theoron Carmichael, one of the papers authors, speaking on behalf 58 00:03:32,720 --> 00:03:36,200 Speaker 1: of the team. He explained the focus outside of the 59 00:03:36,200 --> 00:03:38,560 Speaker 1: Milky Way was due to the number of X ray 60 00:03:38,600 --> 00:03:41,600 Speaker 1: sources within the field of view of the Chandra observatory. 61 00:03:42,080 --> 00:03:44,920 Speaker 1: This made things more convenient to observe by allowing for 62 00:03:44,960 --> 00:03:47,400 Speaker 1: a focus on one area of the sky and not 63 00:03:47,440 --> 00:03:49,920 Speaker 1: having to point the telescope in very different locations in 64 00:03:49,960 --> 00:03:52,880 Speaker 1: the sky. As of now, we're not aware of any 65 00:03:53,000 --> 00:03:55,880 Speaker 1: new exo planet candidates that orbit X resources in the 66 00:03:55,920 --> 00:03:59,560 Speaker 1: Milky Way. This technique is certainly applicable to X resources 67 00:03:59,640 --> 00:04:04,880 Speaker 1: within the Milky Way, and perhaps now scientists will be 68 00:04:04,920 --> 00:04:09,960 Speaker 1: inspired to look when their turn comes up on Chandra. Unfortunately, 69 00:04:10,120 --> 00:04:13,160 Speaker 1: due to this potential planet's tremendous distance from Earth and 70 00:04:13,480 --> 00:04:16,679 Speaker 1: unique system composition, it's going to take a long time 71 00:04:16,720 --> 00:04:21,360 Speaker 1: to verify whether it actually exists. The system has two stars, 72 00:04:21,400 --> 00:04:24,640 Speaker 1: a neutron star or black hole astronomers aren't exactly sure 73 00:04:24,680 --> 00:04:27,479 Speaker 1: which that's emitting the X rays observed to be dimming 74 00:04:27,560 --> 00:04:31,159 Speaker 1: during the transit, and a companion star that's twenty times 75 00:04:31,160 --> 00:04:35,320 Speaker 1: the mass of our own son. The planetary candidate orbits 76 00:04:35,440 --> 00:04:39,599 Speaker 1: both of those celestial objects, making it circumbinary, and it 77 00:04:39,680 --> 00:04:43,240 Speaker 1: takes roughly seventy years to make that orbit, so the 78 00:04:43,240 --> 00:04:45,719 Speaker 1: next time a transit might be visible would be several 79 00:04:45,760 --> 00:04:50,560 Speaker 1: decades from now. Carmichael said, Since the next transit event 80 00:04:50,640 --> 00:04:52,800 Speaker 1: is so uncertain, it could be as soon as decades 81 00:04:52,839 --> 00:04:55,599 Speaker 1: from now or much longer. There aren't any plans in 82 00:04:55,640 --> 00:05:00,360 Speaker 1: place to take follow up observations of this particular planet candidate. Instead, 83 00:05:00,560 --> 00:05:04,280 Speaker 1: new X ray observations and archival data of previous observations 84 00:05:04,440 --> 00:05:07,720 Speaker 1: are more readily available to search for more planet candidates 85 00:05:07,880 --> 00:05:12,760 Speaker 1: like this one. So while the existence of M fifty 86 00:05:12,839 --> 00:05:15,680 Speaker 1: one u l S one B might never be verified, 87 00:05:16,120 --> 00:05:19,040 Speaker 1: researchers plan to use it as inspiration to search for 88 00:05:19,120 --> 00:05:22,120 Speaker 1: other planetary candidates like it, far beyond the bounds of 89 00:05:22,120 --> 00:05:30,760 Speaker 1: our galaxy and perhaps even within it. Today's episode is 90 00:05:30,760 --> 00:05:34,240 Speaker 1: based on the article Researchers find first potential planet outside 91 00:05:34,240 --> 00:05:36,520 Speaker 1: the Milky Way on how stuff works dot Com, written 92 00:05:36,520 --> 00:05:39,560 Speaker 1: by Valerie Stymack. Brain Stuff is production by Heart Radio 93 00:05:39,640 --> 00:05:41,440 Speaker 1: in partnership with how stuff works dot Com, and it 94 00:05:41,520 --> 00:05:44,200 Speaker 1: is produced by Tyler Clang. Or more podcasts from my 95 00:05:44,200 --> 00:05:47,000 Speaker 1: heart Radio, visit the i heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, 96 00:05:47,080 --> 00:05:48,840 Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.