Note Spoiler Alert...


As you may have read in earlier in my blog I loved 2010.  Not so wild about 2001 maybe I'm just not smart enough to get it...I don't know.  But loved 2010.  Anyways one of the themes behind 2010 is New Life...in different forms.  One of the forms is the possibility that a planet can change into a star.  Now I remember some 20 years ago there was a popular theory that Jupiter was a failed star-- (it was popular right around the time when people thought California could fall into the ocean if the big one hit it.) We know now that both aren't a possibility.  Or is it.  Scratch the whole plate tectonics thing cause I'm pretty sure that California that half of formula is firmly -glued- to Pacific plate and the other half is firmly -glued- to the North American plate.  Now whether Los Angeles one day will be in Canada is a completely different story.

But back to the Jupiter thing.  The latest scientific studies postulates that maybe there is a connection between planets and the evolution of stars.  Obviously beside the what we already know and love.  I was always taught that planets are planets and stars are stars.  And there is no switching between the two like in 2010.  Now don't get me wrong I still love it.  The best part about the movie was that there was a possibility but after learned better I thought the movie was cool but the science was bad.  Maybe not...


Here's an excerpt from a recent article which has me taking another look at the brilliance of Arthur C. Clarke and his work.  Btw check out 2010 when you can.  Or look back in my blog for it!


Discovery - A Mystery Object That Could Be The 'Missing Link' Between Stars And Planets


Two new exoplanets mean that the COROT mission(1) has now found a total of four new exoplanets in its 510 day journey. COROT started observations of its sixth star field at the beginning of May and, during this observation phase which will last 5 months, will simultaneously observe 12,000 stars.


The two new planets are gas giants of the hot Jupiter type, which orbit very close to their parent star and tend to have extensive atmospheres because heat from the nearby star gives them energy to expand. But an oddity dubbed ‘COROT-exo-3b’ has raised particular interest among astronomers. It appears to be something between a brown dwarf, a sub-stellar object without nuclear fusion at its core but with some stellar characteristics, and a planet. Its radius is too small for it to be a super-planet. If it is a star, it would be among the smallest ever detected.


Follow-up observations from the ground have pinned it at 20 Jupiter massses. This makes it twice as dense as the metal Platinum. Scientists suspect that with the detection of COROT-exo-3b, they might just have discovered the missing link between stars and planets. COROT has also detected extremely faint signals that, if confirmed, could indicate the existence of another exoplanet, as small as 1.7 times Earth’s radius.

This is an encouraging sign in the delicate and difficult search for small, rocky exoplanets that COROT has been designed for.  end article

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