Mit Study On Exoplanets

[Moontanman]

An exoplanet study by MIT suggests that rocky Earth sized worlds are likely to be in stable circular orbits similar to the Earth's orbit around the Sun. Many larger exoplanets have orbits wildly out of sync with the regular orbits of our own solar system. This study suggest that more Earth sized planets with regular circular orbits maybe closer to the norm for planets in that size range.

 

 http://www.gizmag.com/earth-sized-exoplanets-circular-orbits/37815/

 

A team of researchers from MIT and Aarhus University, Denmark, have discovered that Earth-sized exoplanets orbit their parent stars in the same way that our planet orbits our own Sun – maintaining a roughly equidistant circular orbit. The discovery further narrows the characteristics of worlds that could potentially play host to extraterrestrial life.

 

Astronomers have long wondered whether the highly-structured orbital trend displayed in our solar system was simply the norm, or the result of an amazing coincidence. A new study that examined the orbits of 74 exoplanets orbiting 28 distant stars appears to put the question to rest.