Science/Cosmology, doing what it does best: Continuous refinement:

Discussion in 'Astronomy, Exobiology, & Cosmology' started by paddoboy, Jun 17, 2016.

  1. paddoboy Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    27,543
    Black holes and measuring gravitational waves:

    The supermassive black holes found at the centre of every galaxy, including our own Milky Way, may, on average, be smaller than we thought, according to work led by University of Southampton astronomer Dr Francesco Shankar.

    Read more at: http://phys.org/news/2016-06-black-holes-gravitational.html#jCp



    and....................

    Clouds, haze cause astronomers to overestimate size of exoplanets:

    New research suggests the size of exoplanets may be routinely overestimated, and clouds, scientists say, are to blame.

    Astronomers and their observatories have become rather adept at spotting exoplanets, but gathering details -- the planet's size, mass, composition -- remains a challenge.

    To better understand the accuracy of their observations, researchers recently took a closer look at two seemingly similar low-mass exoplanets. The two planets orbit their host star in 5 and 12 days and are roughly the same size, at 4 and 5 times the diameter of Earth, respectively. The inner planet is less than six times the mass of Earth and the outer planet is 28 times as massive as Earth, so their similar size suggests the inner planet has a very low density.
     

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