2012-12-21-321

A diamond planet twice the size of Earth? Hello ladies!

Orbiting a star that is visible to the naked eye, astronomers have discovered a planet twice the size of our own made largely out of diamond.

The rocky planet, called 55 Cancri e, orbits a sun-like star in the constellation of Cancer and is moving so fast that a year there lasts a mere 18 hours.This diamond-rich super-Earth is likely just one example of the rich sets of discoveries that await us.An artists impression of the interior of 55 Cancri e. Source: Haven Giguere / Yale UniversityDiscovered by a US-Franco research team, its radius is twice that of Earths with a mass eight times greater. That would give it the same density as Earth, although previously observed diamond planets are thought to be a lot denser. It is also incredibly hot, with temperatures on its surface reaching 1,648 degrees Celsius."The surface of this planet is likely covered in graphite and diamond rather than water and granite," said Nikku Madhusudhan, the Yale researcher whose findings are due to be published in the journal Astrophysical Journal Letters.Advertisement The study - with Olivier Mousis at the Institut de Recherche en Astrophysique et Planetologie in Toulouse, France - estimates that at least a third of the planets mass, the equivalent of about three Earth masses, could be diamond.Diamond planets have been spotted before but this is the first time one has been seen orbiting a sun-like star and studied in such detail."This is our first glimpse of a rocky world with a fundamentally different chemistry from Earth," Madhusudhan said, adding that the discovery of the carbon-rich planet meant distant rocky planets could no longer be assumed to have chemical constituents, interiors, atmospheres, or biologies similar to Earth.An artists impression of 55 Cancri e orbiting its sun in Cancer. Source: NASADavid Spergel, an astronomer at Princeton University, said it was relatively simple to work out the basic structure and history of a star once you know its mass and age."Planets are much more complex. This diamond-rich super-Earth is likely just one example of the rich sets of discoveries that await us as we begin to explore planets around nearby stars.""Nearby" is a relative concept in astronomy. Any fortune-hunter considering setting up a mine to set up a college fund for their kids will find Cancri e about 40 light years, or 230 trillion miles, from home.Source: Reuters