Astronomers Are Predicting At Least Two More Large Planets In The Solar System

[Harley]

Astronomers Are Predicting At Least Two More Large Planets In The Solar System

JANUARY 15, 2015

A group of astronomers from the UK and Spain maintain at least two planets must exist beyond Neptune and Pluto in order to explain the orbital behavior of objects that are even farther out, called extreme trans-Neptunian objects (ETNO).

In two new paper published this week, scientists at the Complutense University of Madrid and the University of Cambridge noted that the most accepted theory of trans-Neptunian objects is that they should orbit at a distance of about 150 AU, be in an orbital plane – or inclination – similar to the planets in our Solar System, and they should be randomly distributed.

But that differs from what is actually observed. What astronomers see are groupings of objects with widely disperse distances (between 150 AU and 525 AU) and orbital inclinations that vary between 0 to 20 degrees.

“This excess of objects with unexpected orbital parameters makes us believe that some invisible forces are altering the distribution of the orbital elements of the ETNO,” said Carlos de la Fuente Marcos, scientist at UCM and co-author of the study, “ and we consider that the most probable explanation is that other unknown planets exist beyond Neptune and Pluto.”

He added that the exact number is uncertain, but given the limited data that is available, their calculations suggest “there are at least two planets, and probably more, within the confines of our solar system.”

In their studies, the team analyzed the effects of what is called the ‘Kozai mechanism,’ which is related to the gravitational perturbation that a large body exerts on the orbit of another much smaller and further away object. They looked at how the highly eccentric comet 96P/Machholz1 is influenced by Jupiter (it will come near the orbit of Mercury in 2017, but it travels as much as 6 AU at aphelion) and it may “provide the key to explain the puzzling clustering of orbits around argument of perihelion close to 0° recently found for the population of ETNOs,” the team wrote in one of their papers.


At least two unknown planets could exist in our solar system beyond Pluto. / Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech.

They also looked at the dwarf planet discovered last year called 2012 VP113 in the Oort cloud (its closest approach to the Sun is about 80 astronomical units) and how some researchers say it appears its orbit might be influenced by the possible presence of a dark and icy super-Earth, up to ten times larger than our planet.

“This Sedna-like object has the most distant perihelion of any known minor planet and the value of its argument of perihelion is close to 0°,” the team writes in their second paper. “This property appears to be shared by almost all known asteroids with semimajor axis greater than 150 au and perihelion greater than 30 au (the extreme trans-Neptunian objects or ETNOs), and this fact has been interpreted as evidence for the existence of a super-Earth at 250 au. In this scenario, a population of stable asteroids may be shepherded by a distant, undiscovered planet larger than the Earth that keeps the value of their argument of perihelion librating around 0° as a result of the Kozai mechanism.”

Of course, the theory put forth in two papers published by the team goes against the predictions of current models on the formation of the Solar System, which state that there are no other planets moving in circular orbits beyond Neptune.

But the team pointed to the recent discovery of a planet-forming disk around the star HL Tauri that lies more than 100 astronomical units from the star. HL Tauri is more massive and younger than our Sun and the discovery suggests that planets can form several hundred astronomical units away from the center of the system.

The team based their analysis by studying 13 different objects, so what is needed is more observations of the outer regions of our Solar System to determine what might be hiding out there.

Source: Universe Today

[Karma Ninja]

I remember seeing this news a while back and thinking about how the Sumerians had more planets depicted in our solar system. I believe another ancient culture had more planets depicted in hieroglyphs, as well. Either way, this addition and the knowledge that another planet used to exist (Tiamat - which was destroyed in a celestial collision and is now the debris in the asteroid belt) we are able to reinforce the idea that ancient civilizations had advanced technology. Not that many on here would doubt that but it's still not accepted mainstream knowledge and this strengthens an alternative argument.

Thanks for sharing.

[yelik]

if they are large their gravity could have an effect on earth which would not be good news

[Sunny-side-up]

How can such objects not be seen or known about?

Just shows how small our range of knowledge is at the extreme edge of our solar-system ha!

By this admission they might as well say there could be anything out there, and there probably is

[Ellisa]

Maybe we are looking (listening?) in the wrong place--- or it's a really long way away and it's on;y recently we have started to discover what is out there. And perhaps Pluto is a planet after all.