Rocky planets may circle many white dwarfs
3 April 2006
Traces of heavy elements in the light the dead stars emit suggests white dwarfs are devouring asteroids – and five prime examples have been found
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Found 317 results for dwarf planet
Brown dwarfs weighed directly for first time
15 March 2006
A pair of the "failed" stars, orbiting each other, give up their weighty secret – the breakthrough may allow other suspected brown dwarfs to be identified
Directly detected exoplanet has its temperature taken
22 February 2006
The gas giant is orbiting a red dwarf 63 light years away – scientists using the Spitzer Space Telescope have measured it at a toasty 844°C
Milky Way brims with singleton stars
27 January 2006
Most of the stars in the galaxy are born alone and live their lives in isolation, a controversial new analysis suggests – all the better for alien life-forms
Smallest extrasolar planet revealed by microlensing
25 January 2006
The find suggests Earth-like planets are abundant in the galaxy and validates a technique that should be able to find them
2005: The year in astronomy
2 January 2006
The distant universe came into unprecedented focus in 2005 and astronomers found the source of some of the most powerful explosions in the cosmos
Tiny brown dwarf may yield mini solar system
30 November 2005
The discovery raises questions about how small a star can be before it is too tiny to support planet formation
Could Earth survive the Sun's demise?
9 September 2005
Solar systems may persist around stars that reach the end of their lifetimes, flare up and collapse into white dwarves, new observations suggest
Most Earth-like exoplanet yet is discovered
14 June 2005
The planet, just seven or eight times as massive as Earth, is found circling a nearby star – similar discoveries look set to follow
Young Sun's X-ray flares may have saved Earth
11 May 2005
Titanic flares may create turbulence in the swirling dust discs around young stars, preventing nascent planets from spiralling in to their destruction
