When you buy through links on our site , we may earn an affiliate commission . Here ’s how it works .
Tucked aside in the constellation Coma Berenices just 105 tripping - years from Earth , the star HD 110067 is a hidden gem of theMilky Way . This parent star has direct its bedding material of six exoplanets toorbit in a cosmic waltz , interlock in rhythmic timing by gravitative military group . Synchronicity like this takes practice — but novel enquiry suggests that the maven ’s elegant sextuplet system might be gazillion of old age vernal than previously think . If so , it might dwindle down the campaigner for life - abide satellite in this anomalous organization .
Previous study that used the Hertzsprung - Russell diagram — a try out - and - genuine chart that traces a star ’s years through its luminosity and temperature — placed the hotshot at about 8 billion age honest-to-god . But for star less massive than the sun , this method may falter , concord toKlaus - Peter Schröder , an astronomer at the University of Guanajuato in Mexico .
The planets of the star HD 110067 create an elegant geometric pattern through their clockwork-like orbits.
So Schröder and his colleagues set out to reappraise the champion ’s age by examining other characteristics : its activity levels and rotary motion rate . Their new study assign HD 110067 at a comparatively spry 2.5 billion years old — roughly 5.5 billion years youthful than initially figure . The team ’s enquiry was release Nov. 22 in the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics .
Dating with the stars
The team first guess the maven ’s activity by analyzing wavelengths of ionized calcium , an element telescope can easily spot in live stellar atmospheres . As a star’smagnetic fieldsgenerate energy and heat its outer stratum , calcium atoms become excited and give off a distinguishable color of visible radiation . The younger the star , the strong of an expelling investigator will find .
" A headliner like oursunthat ’s halfway through its life history rhythm is somewhat active , " Schröder said . " But this superstar is a lot more fighting than that . "
Related:‘Mathematically perfect ' star scheme being investigated for potential foreign technology
Next , the squad analyzed the star ’s " spin - down " — a gradual braking of rotation that all stars experience . HD 110067 takes about 20 Earth days to fill out one spin , placing it in the earlier stages of its retardation . ( For comparison , the older and slower sunlight takes at least 27 days to rotate once on its axis vertebra , fit in toNASA . ) With this information , the researcher looked for analogue stars — such as the starring doppelgänger Sigma Draconis in the northern configuration Draco — to zero in on HD 110067 ’s epoch in life-time .
" Because these stars have similar phylogenesis tracks and rotation rates , we can understand what point the star is at in its lifespan , " said lead study authorMaddie Loupien , an uranology master ’s student at Sorbonne University in Paris . The atomic number 20 lines and spin rate led the squad to calculate an eld of about 2.5 billion year for HD 110067 — give or take 800 million year .
Even if this measurement could be more accurate , it still paints a far more lifelike portrait of the genius ’s age than the number derived from the Hertzsprung - Russell diagram , according toAdam Burgasser , an exoplanet legion star researcher at the University of California , San Diego who was not involved in the research .
" This team really did their due diligence to double - stop the star ’s years with robust methods , " Burgasser said . This truer estimation should also help uranologist understand how the adept ’s surrounding exoplanets have evolved , he added .
Possibilities of life?
The utter clockwork of HD 110067 ’s planet does n’t necessarily expect tenacious - term parenting from a middle - aged star . Rather , according to Schröder , it may have taken as little as 1 billion years for some of the intimate major planet to start practise their measured dance through a gravitative phenomenon call tidal locking — meaning one side of a satellite forever faces its server star , much like thefixed face of Earth ’s moon .
— storm find in alien planet ’s air could upend decades of planet formation hypothesis
— Nearby exoplanet has grown a bum 44 time longer than Earth — and it ’s acting like a gargantuan ' astral wind cone '
— ' Baby ' exoplanet , equivalent to 2 - calendar week - one-time baby , is the youngest foreign public ever espy — and it ’s orbiting a wonky hotshot
HD 110067 ’s unexpected youth may also radiate a new luminance on exoplanet surround . So far , all six known planet in the system ambit closely to their parent star , where conditions are too sear for life to lift . But current exoplanet detection methods favor major planet with smaller orbit . More planet may yet orbit farther from HD 110067 in its habitable zone and accordingly have milder climates , Schröder tell .
But temperature is just one broker ; younger stars also spewlethal doses of X - rays and gamma rays . In turn , HD 110067 ’s newly refined age may limit the possibleness of animation on these unseen alien worlds .
