A ninth planet?

[fredinno]

3 hours ago, Rdivine said:

How about Nibiru/Nemesis? They could mess with all the conspiracy theorists out there >:) 

 

Naming it after the first scientist that observes it directly is also appropriate.

But then we would get a similar situation to Uranus's moons. I mean, Ariel? Miranda? Oberon? Really?

[Rdivine]

15 minutes ago, fredinno said:

But then we would get a similar situation to Uranus's moons. I mean, Ariel? Miranda? Oberon? Really?

Don't the scientists get credit to be the first to observe/discover the planet?

[batman78781]

2 minutes ago, Rdivine said:

Don't the scientists get credit to be the first to observe/discover the planet?

Not sure, a google search doesn't say much about it since no planet has been found for so long. Keeping in mind the IAU might just call it something stupid from the start.

[Kobymaru]

Hi!
First off, I know that there is another thread about the possible 9th planet, but I feel like my question would get lost in the discussion. If the mods think this should not be a separate thread, please merge it.

I will refer to this Article here, because of all the "popular science" articles, it seems to be the most detailed: http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2016/01/feature-astronomers-say-neptune-sized-planet-lurks-unseen-solar-system

So apparently, planet hunters have found evidence of a ninth planet, based on the orbits of other celestial bodies in our system. If I understand correctly, they found 6 bodies with highly eccentric, for which the periapsis lies in approximately the same region of space, which appears to be close or "on" the plane of ecliptic. Pic: 

Spoiler

 

Ok, but that is already the extent of my knowledge. How is this indicative of another large body?

I assume, it was some sort of gravity assist that knocked those objects far out. But why would the gravity assist cause those objects to have such a similar periapsis? Is that some sort of "intersection point"? What could have been their previous orbit? 

Also, why does the "suggested Planet X orbit" not intersect the other orbits (or at least not near their Periapsis?)

I want to believe, but I'm a bit lost with the orbital mechanics. Could some smart people walk me through, here?

ps.: Here's another pic, with some more details:

Spoiler

 

Edited January 21, 2016 by Kobymaru

[OrtwinS]

Don't pin me down on this, but from what I understood it's because of the direction of the other orbits.

These small 'dirty ice balls' orbits are all pointed in more or less random directions, they are all so small they don't really influnce each other that much and therefore can go pretty much any orbit they want.

However, they found that on one side of the solar system there are none of these objects, which seems to indicate that some other (heavy) object might/must have cleared that space. Assuming that in the course of billions of years all other small objects in the same region have gotten flung further out or in the solar system.

Try this vid:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6poHQ2h00ZA

[1of6Billion]

20 minutes ago, OrtwinS said:

[snip]

However, they found that on one side of the solar system there are none of these objects, which seems to indicate that some other (heavy) object might/must have cleared that space. Assuming that in the course of billions of years all other small objects in the same region have gotten flung further out or in the solar system.

Try this vid:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6poHQ2h00ZA

Is that for sure? Or is there an equal amount/mass of simply not yet discovered bodies on the opposite side?

[Stone Blue]

7 minutes ago, 1of6Billion said:

Is that for sure? Or is there an equal amount/mass of simply not yet discovered bodies on the opposite side?

Well, I would imagine that's part of why the 9th planet is STILL only theoretical...

[Kobymaru]

1 hour ago, OrtwinS said:

However, they found that on one side of the solar system there are none of these objects, which seems to indicate that some other (heavy) object might/must have cleared that space. Assuming that in the course of billions of years all other small objects in the same region have gotten flung further out or in the solar system.

So basically, it's not that Planet X has ever encountered those rocks, it's more that it flung out everything on the other side of the system, where itself is supposed to be. Correct?

[Findthepin1]

I just realized that this planet doesn't explain the kuiper cliff. It's too far away to have a significant effect on objects at that distance. 

[Jimbodiah]

Tylo!!!!

[lajoswinkler]

If it's lighter than Neptune, it might be an entirely new class of planetary bodies. Perhaps something like large version of icy satellites and dwarf planets. Given the circumstances, it might even have an actual phase boundary, a cryogenic ocean, something none of the giant planets have due to enormous temperatures inside of them, gradually turning matter into supercritical fluid.

[Mitchz95]

Indeed. It would be awesome to send in a probe to take a closer look, though it would probably take several decades to get there.

[Rakaydos]

There's apparently some relly technical resonant-orbit type stuff involved. Almost everything we see is stable over astronmical timelines with a planet of mass (earth x10) in that orbit- the stuff that would be unstable and swept up, is missing.

[GagaX]

This wouldn't be the first time a planet was discovered this way: 

In the 1840s, Urbain Le Verrier used Newtonian mechanics to predict the position of the then-undiscovered planet Neptune after analysing perturbations in the orbit of Uranus. Subsequent observations of Neptune in the late 19th century led astronomers to speculate that Uranus's orbit was being disturbed by another planet besides Neptune. That was Pluto.

 

[peadar1987]

6 minutes ago, GagaX said:

This wouldn't be the first time a planet was discovered this way: 

In the 1840s, Urbain Le Verrier used Newtonian mechanics to predict the position of the then-undiscovered planet Neptune after analysing perturbations in the orbit of Uranus. Subsequent observations of Neptune in the late 19th century led astronomers to speculate that Uranus's orbit was being disturbed by another planet besides Neptune. That was Pluto.

 

In fact, Pluto is too small to significantly perturb Neptune's orbit. The observed perturbations turned out to be an observation error or a mistake in the maths

[GagaX]

10 minutes ago, peadar1987 said:

In fact, Pluto is too small to significantly perturb Neptune's orbit. The observed perturbations turned out to be an observation error or a mistake in the maths

Don't know about that, just copied it from wikipedia. Anyway, my theory is that someone used Kopernicus mod to upgrade solar system.

[Kobymaru]

57 minutes ago, Rakaydos said:

There's apparently some relly technical resonant-orbit type stuff involved. Almost everything we see is stable over astronmical timelines with a planet of mass (earth x10) in that orbit- the stuff that would be unstable and swept up, is missing.

That actually helps a lot for understanding, thanks!

I tried reading the original research paper, but those diagrams in weird phase spaces that I've never heard of were a bit too much for me 

By the way, turns out it's not just those 6 Objects that considered. They also considered 5 other objects, those were approximately perpendicular to the other ones and also fit the math (so they claimed, I wouldn't know).

[WeirdCulture]

So they finally find Rupert?

[Nikolai]

1 hour ago, GagaX said:

In the 1840s, Urbain Le Verrier used Newtonian mechanics to predict the position of the then-undiscovered planet Neptune after analysing perturbations in the orbit of Uranus. Subsequent observations of Neptune in the late 19th century led astronomers to speculate that Uranus's orbit was being disturbed by another planet besides Neptune. That was Pluto.

We-ell, Pluto happened to be where we thought we should look.  As more and more observations poured in and the maximum size of Pluto continued to shrink, it became increasingly evident that Pluto couldn't account for these anomalies.  (A joke paper was even published predicting that at the rate Pluto's "maximum size" was shrinking, it should disappear entirely by 1980.)

Later, when Voyager 2 went past these planets and their masses and positions could be measured more precisely, it was determined that the "anomalies" seen in Uranus' and Neptune's orbits could be adequately accounted for through measuring error.

[relin]

1 minute ago, Nikolai said:

Later, when Voyager 2 went past these planets and their masses and positions could be measured more precisely, it was determined that the "anomalies" seen in Uranus' and Neptune's orbits could be adequately accounted for through measuring error.

So we essentially got lucky in finding Pluto? That's crazy.

[Nuke]

Quote

Planet X

it occurred to me that you really cant call it planet X anymore. since the demotion of pluto you are actually looking for planet IX.

[RuBisCO]

Question: if this planet is real and found, what do you think it will be named?

[LaytheDragon]

15 hours ago, Mitchz95 said:

But ... I don't wanna wait five years!

Exactly my thought.  5 years for confirmation, and if it's found, then a much longer wait for a mission to be launched and for said mission to reach this planet. If we could get a probe to it, I'd hope that it wouldn't be a sad flyby where orbit isn't made (though I'd love to see a nice color image).

[jwenting]

15 hours ago, Rdivine said:

How about Nibiru/Nemesis? They could mess with all the conspiracy theorists out there >:) 

 

darn, you stole my idea Put the joke on Sitchin for good...

4 hours ago, Mitchz95 said:

Indeed. It would be awesome to send in a probe to take a closer look, though it would probably take several decades to get there.

we could try for a torch ship

 

[K^2]

13 hours ago, fredinno said:

But then we would get a similar situation to Uranus's moons. I mean, Ariel? Miranda? Oberon? Really?

What does that have to do with discoverers' names? These are Shakespearean characters. And being fictional characters, it's not much different from naming planets after Gods.

4 hours ago, Mitchz95 said:

Indeed. It would be awesome to send in a probe to take a closer look, though it would probably take several decades to get there.

Well, someone's an optimist...  With periapsis of 200AU, and it might be significantly higher, we could get a probe to periapsis in a few decades, yes. But this orbit has a period of 10-20ky. So it's very unlikely to be anywhere near periapsis right now. Given the kind of rockets we can realistically build, we might be able to make a probe that gets to it in a few centuries.

Edited January 21, 2016 by K^2