Astrologists have long searched for the mysterious planet on the external tributaries of our solar system. Now, researchers are trying a new approach – looking for reflected sunlight, looking to sign the heat of the planet.
The research began when scientists noticed strange patterns in the orbits of remote ice beings outside Neptune, called the Kwiber belt organisms.
Their extraordinary alignment indicates a huge “Planet Nine” – attracting them to its place. If this is real, then the ninth planet will be from 5 to 10 times the mass of the Earth and 400-800 times from the sun. At this distance, it would be very faint to discover traditional telescopes.
As the Amos Chen from the National University of Tsing Hawa, the team realized that the search for Planet Nine heat can work better than searching for reflected light. Here is the reason: doubling the distance makes the reflected light 16 times, but the heat becomes only 4 times.
They used data from Akari, a Japanese space telescope who wiped the sky in the light of infrared, which is to discover thermal glow of the cold planet. Unlike the Earth’s telescopes, Akari was not banned due to the Earth’s atmosphere.
The team focused on a specific sky area, where the simulation suggested that the ninth planet may be, based on the orbits of the Keper belt objects. Challenge? Distinctively distinguish the planet from stars, galaxies and cosmic debris.
Solving them: The ninth planet will appear over one day, but it moves a little over for months. By comparing Akari notes at different times, they filtered wrong signals like cosmic rays.
After an accurate analysis, they are Find Candidates. Both appear in the expected location and emit from the expected infrared light from the ninth planet. While not evidence, this is the strongest progress yet.
Follow-up notes with more powerful telescopes are needed to confirm whether this is the ninth-or just professionals like remote galaxies. If confirmed, Planet Nine will reshape our understanding of the solar system.
