Rogue Planet has Molten Iron Rain
CBC Radio | Posted: November 13, 2015 8:44 PM | Last Updated: November 13, 2015
Starless planet is hot enough to have exotic weather.
Astronomers have detected weather on a starless planet, and that weather seems to involve clouds of aerosol iron and rocky rain.
Dr. Beth Biller, a Chancellor's Fellow in the Institute of Astronomy at the University of Edinburgh, and her colleagues, have been studying a strange planet, bigger and more massive then Jupiter, that either formed independently or escaped its star. The planet is young and very hot, and by observing changes in its brightness over time, they have concluded that clouds sometimes obscure its face, and that the clouds indicate variations in temperature in the atmosphere.
Given that the temperature of the planet is on the order of 800°C, then the clouds are likely made of silicates and perhaps iron, meaning that a hard rain is going to fall.
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