{"id":18359,"date":"2018-09-19T01:48:22","date_gmt":"2018-09-18T17:48:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp-productionenv-bjg9h2g2bgg5b8aa.southeastasia-01.azurewebsites.net\/news\/fascinating-astronomers-spot-super-earth-orbiting-mr-spocks-fictional-home-star\/"},"modified":"2018-09-19T01:48:22","modified_gmt":"2018-09-18T17:48:22","slug":"fascinating-astronomers-spot-super-earth-orbiting-mr-spocks-fictional-home-star","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/news\/fascinating-astronomers-spot-super-earth-orbiting-mr-spocks-fictional-home-star\/","title":{"rendered":"Fascinating! Astronomers spot super-Earth orbiting Mr. Spock\u2019s fictional home star"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure id=\"attachment_448356\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-448356\" style=\"width: 630px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full-width wp-image-448356\" src=\"https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/180918-vulcan-630x630.jpg\" alt=\"HD 26965\" width=\"630\" height=\"630\" srcset=\"https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/180918-vulcan-630x630.jpg 630w, https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/180918-vulcan-150x150.jpg 150w, https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/180918-vulcan-768x768.jpg 768w, https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/180918-vulcan-100x100.jpg 100w, https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/180918-vulcan.jpg 1000w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 630px) 100vw, 630px\"><figcaption data-nosnippet=\"\" id=\"caption-attachment-448356\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">An artist\u2019s conception shows a super-Earth in orbit around HD 26965, which is Mr. Spock\u2019s home star in \u201cStar Trek\u201d lore. (University of Florida Illustration)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Has the planet Vulcan been found? Vulcan\u2019s most famous fictional inhabitant, Mr. Spock of \u201cStar Trek\u201d fame, would certainly raise an eyebrow if he heard that astronomers have detected a super-Earth orbiting the star that\u2019s associated with him.<\/p>\n<p>The world orbits a sunlike star that\u2019s a mere 16 light-years away, known as HD 26965 or 40 Eridani A, according to the team behind the Dharma Planet Survey.<\/p>\n<p>In the current&nbsp;Star Trek canon, 40 Eridani A is the star that harbors Spock\u2019s home planet. Some early references pointed to a different star, known as Epsilon Eridani (which is also thought to host at least one exoplanet). But in a 1991 essay, Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry and a group of astronomers argued that 40 Eridani A, the brightest star in a triple-star system, was a better fit because its 4 billion years of existence provided a wider window for pointy-eared intelligent life to evolve.<\/p>\n<p>The latest findings suggest Roddenberry made the right choice: The planet found at 40 Eridani A is roughly twice Earth\u2019s size and completes an orbit around its parent star every 42 Earth days, said University of Florida astronomer Jian Ge.<\/p>\n<p>HD 26965 is an orange dwarf star, only slightly cooler and slightly less massive than our sun, with a 10.1-year magnetic activity cycle that\u2019s nearly identical to our sun\u2019s 11.6-year sunspot cycle. \u201cTherefore, HD 26965 may be an ideal host star for an advanced civilization,\u201d Tennessee State University astronomer Matthew Muterspaugh&nbsp;said today in a news release.<\/p>\n<p><iframe id=\"twitter-widget-0\" scrolling=\"no\" frameborder=\"0\" allowtransparency=\"true\" allowfullscreen=\"true\" class=\"\" style=\"position: absolute; visibility: hidden; width: 0px; height: 0px; display: block; flex-grow: 1;\" title=\"X Post\" src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/embed\/Tweet.html?creatorScreenName=b0yle&amp;dnt=true&amp;embedId=twitter-widget-0&amp;features=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%3D%3D&amp;frame=false&amp;hideCard=false&amp;hideThread=false&amp;id=1042212337787129856&amp;lang=en&amp;origin=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.geekwire.com%2F2018%2Fvulcan-super-earth-spock%2F&amp;sessionId=1e395d4cb452b1048966fbb29957e41c0da68ddb&amp;siteScreenName=geekwire&amp;theme=light&amp;widgetsVersion=6a3ad42b224df%3A1778106238597&amp;width=550px\" data-tweet-id=\"1042212337787129856\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\" data-twitter-extracted-i1782802491013824127=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Scientists find a real super-Earth orbiting fictional Mr. Spock&#8217;s home star \u2013 but it&#8217;s not likely to be called Vulcan: https:\/\/t.co\/8MJQstGcLg H\/T @uf @xiaomabo pic.twitter.com\/dudMKQDJGM<\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Alan Boyle \ud83d\udc7d (@b0yle) September 19, 2018<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p><script async=\"\" src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>The astronomers made their find using the 50-inch Dharma Endowment Foundation Telescope on Mount Lemmon in Arizona, and laid out the details in a paper published by the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. But you don\u2019t need a telescope to see 40 Eridani A.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis star can be seen with the naked eye, unlike the host stars of most of the known planets discovered to date,\u201d said lead study author Bo Ma, a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Florida. \u201cNow anyone can see 40 Eridani on a clear night and be proud to point out Spock\u2019s home.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Unfortunately for Star Trek fans, it\u2019s unlikely that the planet will end up being named Vulcan. The International Astronomical Union recently set up a system for naming exoplanets, but Vulcan already has a history as the name of a hypothetical planet that was once thought to exist within the orbit of Mercury. The IAU nixed using the name for one of Pluto\u2019s moons, and the same rationale would probably lead to Vulcan being counted out for exoplanets as well.<\/p>\n<p>Would Spock, who prides himself on his cold logic, see that as an insult? Not likely. As he once pointed out in a TV episode, \u201cInsults are effective only where emotion is present.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><strong>Update for 5:25 p.m. PT Sept. 26:<\/strong> Originally I wrote that HD 26965\u2019s close-in planet was potentially habitable, but that may be a stretch, according to one of the study\u2019s co-authors, University of Washington astronomer Rory Barnes.<\/p>\n<p>In the news release about the find, the University of Florida\u2019s Jian Ge was quoted as saying that the planet was \u201cjust inside the star\u2019s optimal habitable zone,\u201d but that was meant in the sense that the planet is interior to the habitable zone&nbsp;\u2014 that is, too close to its sun for habitability.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe planet receives 9 to 10 times more incident sunlight than Earth, and about five times that of Venus,\u201d Barnes told GeekWire in an email. \u201cWhile it\u2019s a great big universe, and I hate to say \u2018never,\u2019 the number of properties and processes that would have to come together continuously over billions of years to permit a habitable region on this planet are staggering \u2014 the probability of life on it is vanishingly tiny.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>But don\u2019t give up the search for Spock just yet. NBC News quotes Ge as saying that life forms might be able to survive on the planet\u2019s cooler dark side, particularly if they live in caverns like the ones on Star Trek\u2019s fictional Vulcan.<\/p>\n<p><em>Ma, Ge, Muterspaugh and Barnes are among 27 authors of the paper published in the Monthly Notices, titled \u201cThe First Super-Earth Detection from the High Cadence and High Radial Velocity Precision Dharma Planet Survey.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>An artist\u2019s conception shows a super-Earth in orbit around HD 26965, which is Mr. Spock\u2019s home star in \u201cStar Trek\u201d lore. (University of Florida Illustration) Has the planet Vulcan been found? Vulcan\u2019s most famous fictional inhabitant, Mr. Spock of \u201cStar Trek\u201d fame, would certainly raise an eyebrow if he heard that astronomers have detected a [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[559,5164,5165,4482,5166,4631,4551],"class_list":["post-18359","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-exoplanets","tag-mr-spock","tag-planet-vulcan","tag-science-fiction","tag-spock","tag-star-trek","tag-television"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18359"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18359"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18359\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18359"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18359"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18359"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}