According to a paper that will be published in Astrophysical Journal Letters, the third-closest star system to the Sun is discovered. The duo is the closest star system discovered since 1916. The discovery was made by Kevin Luhman, an associate professor of astronomy and astrophysics at Penn State University and a researcher in Penn State's Center for Exoplanets and Habitable Worlds. By combining the detections of the star system from the various surveys, Luhman was able to measure its distance via parallax, which is the apparent shift of a star in the sky due to Earth's orbit around the Sun. He then used the Gemini South telescope to obtain a spectrum of it, which demonstrated that it had a very cool temperature, and hence was a brown dwarf, which is star that are too small in mass to ever become hot enough to ignite hydrogen fusion. As a result, the newly discovered system is very cool and dim, resembling a giant planet like Jupiter more than a bright star like the Sun.
The star system is named "WISE J104915.57-531906" because it was discovered in a map of the entire sky obtained by the NASA-funded Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) satellite. It is only slightly farther away than the second-closest star, Barnard's star, which was discovered 6.0 light years from the Sun in 1916. The closest star system consists of Alpha Centauri, found to be a neighbor of the Sun in 1839 at 4.4 light years, and the fainter Proxima Centauri, discovered in 1917 at 4.2 light years. “The distance to this brown dwarf pair is 6.5 light years -- so close that Earth's television transmissions from 2006 are now arriving there,” Luhman said. “It will be an excellent hunting ground for planets because it is very close to Earth, which makes it a lot easier to see any planets orbiting either of the brown dwarfs. Since it is the third-closest star system, in the distant future it might be one of the first destinations for manned expeditions outside our solar system,” Luhman said.
I think it’s an excellent article about the new discovery of the new star system. The author included a lot of quotes from professor Luhman, which made it well-informed while interesting. There are also descriptions of how Luhman found out that it’s 6.5 light years from Sun— parallax, which is closely related to the topic we are studying now. It increases my knowledge on the classification of dwarf stars. Overall, I really enjoyed reading the article, and I hope there are further discoveries soon.
I read the review “Closest Star System Found in a Century” by my classmate Xiao Huang. The article was about a new star system discovered that is fairly close to ours. It is the closest system found in over a century. Xiao was able to present all of the information in a clear and concise manner without losing the attention of the reader. This an important part of writing. Xiao also explained the importance of the discovery well. She explains that this star system is a good place to look for habitable planets. It could provide possible places for humans to colonize in the distant future. This star system will also help us understand brown dwarf stars more, as the system has two brown dwarfs. Xiao also gave some background information about the discovery of another system even closer to ours than the newly discovered one. It gives a good history about star system discoveries. Although it was a very well written review, Xiao’s review can be improved upon. Firstly, Xiao did not put the link to the article. This is important for the readers of the review. It is a minor detail, but is still important. However, she may have just had some technical difficulties. Xiao could have possibly also discussed more about what we know about the star system. What details do we know about the planets, the stars themselves? Are there any signs of life? I, and I am sure many others, would very much enjoy knowing more. One thing that I found very intriguing is that this star system was only discovered now. It is so close to our solar system. How can astronomers have missed something so close? Astronomers have discovered things billions of light years away, but missed something only 6 light years away? I find this strange. Overall, Xiao wrote a very well written review.
ReplyDeleteMy classmate Xiao wrote a great review on the article “Closest Star System Found in a Century.” Xiao did a really great job on this, and made it really interesting to read. I found three things in particular that really stood out to me. First off I thought Xiao did a great job summarizing the information, it was concise in a way that made it easy to understand. Xiao also did a great job using quotes from the real article; this brought a new point of view into the review. The last thing I thought Xiao did well on was how she included a photo, this was something new and interesting and I found it very effective for the review. I do have two critiques on the review; first off no link to the article was provided which did not give the readers a full sense of the review. The second thong was possibly be going into more detail on the summary, it was a good summary, just too brief. The coolest part of this review for me was the fact that we are still discovering new things about or solar system, and that we still have so much to learn. This review was great, and I enjoyed reading it.
ReplyDeleteI read Xiao’s review on the article, “Closest Star System Found in a Century” which talked about the newest discovery of a star system that is just over 6 light years away from our sun. The descriptive information that Xiao gave explaining the article and what was going on was very useful. She stated the professor that made this discovery, Kevin Luhman, and where this discovery was made, Penn State’s Center for Exoplanets and Habitable Worlds. Also, she explained how the newest discovery of this star system would benefit life on Earth. These new star systems could hold planets in their magnetic field, allowing scientist to explore this new matter outside our solar system. Lastly, I enjoyed how Xiao provided a picture above her review to use for reference. The picture works as a diagram, showing distances in light years and the different temperature of the star using different colors. Understanding where everything is in relation to our sun and solar system is important when wanting to understand how this could be beneficial to humanity. One improvement that Xiao can do to improve on her reviews next time is to provide the link to the actual article. Since she just wrote a review, all of the details and other information were probably not given. If the link to the article had been given, comparing it to Xiao’s review could’ve made grading easier. Also, I think in her summary she should have given background information that might not have been said in the article. Some topics that would have been nice to brief upon were explaining the difficulty in finding these stars outside our solar system. Also, a possible mentioning on if they will follow through with these thought of expeditions to the closer stars. Altogether, I really enjoyed reading about this new astronomical finding and how it could possibly have planets to inhabit life on Earth.
ReplyDeleteI read the article summary “Closest star system found in a century” by Xiao. The first thing that Xiao did very well was that she gave an explanation about how this star system was found in a way that the audience could understand. She did not give us a large amount of information that we wouldn’t comprehend. She used the term Parallax and defined us to help us understand it better although we had learned this term in class. Another thing that she did well was giving the straight facts. For example you told us how the name was derived, the years, and the light years away it is. The final thing that made the review better was the diagram included. It gave the reader a better sense using a smaller scale of the actual stars being compared.
ReplyDeleteAlthough the article was impressive there were still some things that could have been done better. One thing that was not included is the true importance of the discovery. What do we know about these stars, and is there life on them? These are both questions that have relevance to the discovery’s importance. Another thing was that she could have included some more background information, which would be useful in understanding this new topic. For example she could have compared them to the stars we know (the sun) so we could understand better.
Over all I think that this article was very interesting. I think that this is a discovery that will continue to occur because as science progresses we will find new things in space as we will be able to reach out further and further. Who knows? Eventually we might find another life form on these outer planets or stars.
I read Xiao's review on the article, "Closest Star System Found in a Century." According to the article, the third closest star system to the Earth has just recently been found. One thing that Xiao did a great job of was providing specific details and factual evidence. For example, Xiao stated that the new found star system is a about 6 light years away. In addition, Xiao did a great job of telling the reader how to scientist used information that we have been studying in class in his discovery. For instance, the scientist used a parallax to determine the how far away the star is. Finally,
ReplyDeleteXiao included so much detail of the name various aspects of the star system. To improve her review for next time, Xiao should add a little bit more of her own opinion because the review was very factual with not much analysis. Moreover, Xiao could add a quote from the article to hear the scientist's voice and perspective on the discovery. I really enjoyed reading Xiao's review on the article because it related really well to the class' curriculum. One thing I learned from Xiao's review is that astronomers are finding new discoveries all the time. It is remarkable to think that this star system went undiscovered for so long considering that it is close to Earth.
Xiao did a great job reviewing her article. The article review was very concise and easy to read. She understood the material and gave it some good background information. Also she included a good quote and gave the commentary a real voice, I felt like I was listening to a person speaking. Although there were a few grammatical mistakes, but there was nothing that could detract from this great review. Also I feel like it was lacking some background information.But overall I think Xiao did a great job portraying the information. But I really thought it was interesting, that there are brown stars that don’t fuse Hydrogen.
ReplyDeleteMy classmate Xiao wrote a very good review of the article “Closest Star System Found in a Century”. She did a very good job of giving a good, interesting summary of the article that did not lose the interest of the reader. Another thing that she did really well was giving information about how the discovery of this third solar system from ours is important for future exploration. She told how finding this will make it easier to find more planets, and will allow this solar system to be one of the first destinations for manned expeditions outside our solar system. A third very interesting thing that Xiao did was she included a picture in her review, which drew in the attention of the reader, and also made it much easier to follow what she was talking about in her review.
ReplyDeleteAlthough Xiao made a very good review of the article, there are a few things that she could have done to improve the review. First, she could have posted a link to the article that she reviewed, which would have made it a lot easier to read the full article, and delve further into this topic. A second thing she could have improved upon was she could have provided a little more information about the solar system, such as if there are any discovered planets in it, or the distance between the stars.
This review of the article provided some very interesting information that I did not previously know. One of the most interesting things that I learned from this article and its review is that there are so few solar systems close to ours, and that more close solar systems are still being discovered.
My classmate Xiao did a great job summarizing and explaining her article. The article review was very clear and easy to read. She clearly understood the article and gave some good background information. Also she included a good quotation and gave the commentary. Although there were a few grammatical mistakes, there was nothing that could detract my attention from this great review. I also feel like it was lacking some background information. But overall I think Xiao did a great job explaining the information. I learned from this review that some star systems weren't discovered until modern day and are still being discovered to this day.
ReplyDeleteMy classmate, Xiao, wrote a review of the article “Closest Star System Found in a Century.” A few aspects of this review that Xiao presented very well were the way that she used a lot of details, such as the specifics from the scientist, she also quoted the article very well, this provided a link to the original article. Xiao also provided a good amount of background information for us as readers to understand the topic. Xiao definitely could have added her own opinion on the subject; this would have helped the review gain a voice. Xiao also could have provided the link to the original article for everyone to read. Overall I thought this review was especially good! One thing that I was really shocked to learn about was how there is so little known about our universe and our stars.
ReplyDeleteMy classmate Xiao did a great job on her review of the article “Closest Star System Found in a Century.” The article was about a new star system was found which is relatively close to our system. One thing Xiao did great was include a picture on her review. This really helped me, as the reader to visualize what she the author is talking about. Another thing Xiao did well was include quotes from the article. This brought a new aspect into the article, that would otherwise not have been there. Third, Xiao’s review was quick and concise. It was not too short that the reader would not understand it, but not too long to bore the reader. Although Xiao’s review was good, there are some things she could do to make it even better. First, she could have added a link to the original article. This would have been nice, because after reading the review, it would be nice to go and read the full article. Second, Xiao could have added some more opinion ot her review, because it sounds too factual. However, these are just minor changes. One thing that I found interesting about her review is that scientists are finding discoveries every day. The only thing that confuses me, is that how did this star system go undiscovered all these years if it is so close to our sun. Overall, Xiao did a great job on her review of the article “Closest Star System Found in a Century.”
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