A Planet Darker than Coal
Picture taken from NPR article
Taking a break from gothic stories and architecture, I read this article on NPR this morning and wanted to share. Apparently scientists, using the Kepler spacecraft have found a planet circling a near by star, 750 lights away. What makes this discovery stand out from all other planets we have seen beyond our solar system is that this planet reflects little to no light even though it is very close to its sun. The planet is a large gas giant, like Jupiter, and is much closer to its star than Jupiter is to our sun. To put this in perspective, if Earth reflects 37% light, making that beautiful blue, this planet reflects less than 1%, making it darker than coal.
To read the rest of the article, read here.
Kepler: Picture taken from NASA website
Taking it one step further (coal to diamonds) -> http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/3492919.stm
August 31, 2011 at 12:23 pm
That is awesome. It makes the Diamond as big as the Ritz looks like small potatoes.
August 31, 2011 at 2:32 pm