Out in the universe, there are invisible rogue planets that might hit the earth. With NASA's new space telescope, we can finally detect any of these planets which are loosely tied to universal gravity.
According to NASA, the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope will be sent up in the mid-2020s. The purpose is to provide answers like how many rogue planets are out there in the Milky Way. Most of the wayward planets are usually hurtling through space while tethered to stars, except those tethered by loose gravity, according to CNN.
How many rouge planets are out there?
They are called xoplanets which are in the outer peripheral of the solar system, moving with the existent gravity in the cosmos and doesn't have planetary orbits. Knowing more about how these wayward planets are formed can also shed light on how they might disrupt planetary systems.
Like a needle in the cosmic haystack, only a few have been detected so far. The technical innovation of the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope is that it can detect these lonely wanderers. Though one of the biggest questions that remain is how many are still out there. This study is published in the Astronomical Journal.
Samson Johnson, the author of the study said that the expanding view of the solar system is getting uncanny. The Roman space telescope will give us more insight into the universe at large. Knowing how man fits into the greater cosmos in the investigation of these exoplanets.
What happens if Earth also becomes free of the sun's gravity and it hurtles in space? This possibility will guide scientists later on.
What makes the device capable is a 2.4-meter mirror that is the focusing component needed to look for planets. The mirror will be used to capture a wide view of the sky that the telescope captures in images. The planets can be detected using the technique of microlensing events that is a planet passing in front of the solar mass, with visible bending of light.
How microlensing helps detect rogue planets
Usually, microlensing happens when anything like black holes causes abnormalities in space-time, the same thing with planets that occupy space. The surrounding area of the object will warp the fabric of space-time.
One example is if any rogue planet will by chance be lined up with a distant star. The starlight will bend all around the object that will increase the size or get a magnifying effect. We can then utilize the light to know how big the object is.
According to Matthew Penny, study co-author, microlensing events will last for a while, but not long. One of the problems that make them hard to spot from Earth is that using more than one land-based telescope does not help things. With the Roman space telescope, it will give us more chances of capturing images of these odd wanderers.
These exo-worlds are not easy to see in the dark cosmic backdrop, most methods fail except the use of microlensing that spots the bending gravity of space-time, seen through light.
Most of these wandering celestial bodies called exo-planets are out there, but the Roman telescope is our eyes in space. It might be crucial to see these wandering planets out there to know if one is coming our way.
Most agree that it is accumulated matter that formed these wayward bodies.
