catdynamics | July 6, 2007High mass planets around metal poor red dwarfs, may put small crack in big theory
New planets just put up on exoplanet.eu - from JJ of the California-Carnegie-AAT group. These were mentioned at Santorini, but I don't think I talked specifically about them at the time, not sure if I failed to note the detailed parameters or because they were just "talked about" rather than formally announced. Outer planet solution does not seem to have fully converged yet, but if I recall the discussion something about a Jupiter mass must be out there - it may move a little bit as more data comes in.
GJ317b…
catdynamics | July 6, 2007Sunny, happy friday.
We approach the iPod, and we ask - is Carter's Large Number Coincidence Argument valid, or does it fail for one or both of the two obvious reasons?
Whoosh goes the randomizer.
Whoosh.
The Covering: Walking Contradiction - Green Day
The Crossing: Danse Des Cygnes - Tchaikovsky
The Crown: Godspeed (Sweet Dreams) - Dixie Chicks
The Root: Overpowered by Funk - Clash
The Past: Kökubaksturinn - Thorbjorn Egner
The Future: Lazy Daisy - Spilverk
The Questioner: Sing Through The Year
The House: Identify The Beat - Marc Smith vs Safe'n'Sound
The Inside: Lilli og Marteinn Læðast…
catdynamics | July 4, 2007Bush may like to think he is non-abelian, but we know he has a nilpotent subgroup.
Not only does he have a nilpotent subset of ideals, but the interesection of his prime ideals is nilradical!
Phbt!
catdynamics | July 3, 2007Congratulations Dr Brian May
Hm, I wonder if he will be looking for a postdoc...
catdynamics | July 3, 2007It was a rough week for the UK, with record floods and terrorist attacks in the middle of a change of government.
As the Y-Ranter points out, the bureaucracy dealt with it in stride
Y'know, they really did. The airports were opened and working smoothly despite the increase in security level, and I figure he knows how things are going down in the floods up Yorkshire way.
Interesting.
catdynamics | July 1, 2007Oh man, Heathrow is not exactly the easiest of airports at the best of times, but landing an hour after the UK went to "critical" security status is not a good time. In the rain.
Oh, and I understand about the whole bus thing, that you don't want large vehicles driven up to the terminal right now - but someone needs to tell people when they do this. Lot of people queued up for a long time waiting, in the rain.
Much more cheerful than Athens though. Mustn't grumble, eh?
Ok, so from the comments at the Extreme Solar Systems conference, and here, I infer we will have some energetic "what is a…
catdynamics | June 30, 2007"The Clean Tech Revolution: The Next Big Growth and Investment Opportunity"
by Ron Pernish and Clint Wilder of CleanEdge
HarperCollins: ISBN-13-978-0-06-089623-2
This books is NOT about investment advice... or so they say, for good and valid and legal reasons.
But each chapter ends in a list of companies, small and large, US and foreign, who are either ramping up "green technology" or are identified as having potential hot new products.
The book is ok, it rambles a bit, and the list of tech is a bit of a hodge podge - your basic renewable energies, biomaterials, and low energy/recyclable/…
catdynamics | June 30, 2007a question in one of the comments to the "Extreme Solar System" threads, was to the effect of - "when will the embargoed/unpublished stuff come out and the rest of us know"?
well, depends...
some of the items were in press or submitted to Nature/Science - these will come out in a matter of weeks, or maybe an ApJL in a few months for the submitted stuff if the editorial board is in a mood that day
some of the results are robust, but the papers have not yet been written, so it will be a while - depends on travel and teaching schedules, co-ordination with co-authors and lazy irresponsible…
catdynamics | June 30, 2007Extreme Solar Systems conference has finished, and the lovely WiFi service at Athens airport just crashed and wiped out what I wrote... aargh.
Hrmph, the previous version was much snappier and comprehensive, with amusing and informative hyperlinks.
Ok, before my battery runs out, here goes...
Lots of new instruments coming online.
Some new dedicated or semi-dedicated planet hunting telescopes.
Good prospects for near future space missions.
Shortage of time for followups. we're probably missing stuff because of slow followup and poor cadence on good targets, this will get much worse as…
catdynamics | June 29, 2007We venture into the future to ask the Mighty iPod One - what IS going on with OJ287?
Whoosh goes the randomizer.
Whoosh.
The Covering: The Love Parade - Undertones
The Crossing: Lullaby
The Crown: Disco 2000 - Pulp
The Root: Get Up Stand Up - Bob Marley
The Past: Popsicle - Talking Heads
The Future: Love Letter - Bonnie Raitt
The Questioner: Hrognin eru að koma - Utangarðsmenn
The House: Sunday Bloody Sunday - U2
The Inside: Four Horsemen - Clash
The Outcome: Sigurður Er Sjómaður - Utangarðsmenn
Hm, the Crossing and Root nail the issue.
The Questioner is about the worker who had just got…
catdynamics | June 29, 2007Still catching up on the Extreme Solar Systems conference...
Lots of interesting stuff on planetary atmospherics.
Models are currently mainly looking at mean temperatures (at the 5-10% level) and horizontal global heat transport. Clear need to incorporate vertical transport and chemistry.
Interesting suggestion by Fortney that titanium oxide may play significant role.
Also clear that the hot Jupiters are very black in the optical, with albedos of 5% or less, which is puzzling.
Clearly they are bright in the infrared.
Some interesting future projects planned - MARVELS is a Sloan survey…
catdynamics | June 29, 2007Did I mention that I have been here a week and not got to the beach yet...
One of the penalties of being an organiser. Of course I slept that one free afternoon, but that was after trying to find the Olympic Airways office for 3 hours - they shut it, apparently people kept bothering them or something - did I mention it has been rather hot here?
Then there are these mystery people who keep sending me lengthy snippets of text they claim to be "thesis chapters" or something. Strange behaviour.
The Macs are nice, but the screen contrast is not good enough to read 20-40 pages of text in the…
catdynamics | June 29, 2007Still at the Extreme Solar Systems conference in Santorini where it has cooled off a bit.
One of the locals assures me this is the worst since the great heat wave of 1916 and that I should come back in october... must make the most of this once-per-century opportunity.
So, more planet news...
There are a couple of more transiting planets in the pipeline - sounds like there is another hot Neptune in the pipeline, and I hear the TrES group found another bloated (1.7 Jovian radii?!) hot Jupiter which was first announced at another meeting a week or two ago.
The COROT people are being very coy…
catdynamics | June 28, 2007I'm still working my way through my notes from day 1 of the conference...
did I mention I have a lots of notes.
Actually, by my count, half-way through day 3, I've seen four very interesting announcements that are embargoed, two because of Nature/Science submission issues, which I will of course honour, and two because the people involved asked us not to discuss the results - so I won't;
and anyway, Ingrid would beat me up if I leaked the latest at this stage...
So, what do we have...
Back to California-Carnegie-AAT team, and JJ reiterates results announced at the AAS on planets around giant…
catdynamics | June 28, 2007More planet news from the Extreme Solar Systems conference
In addition to the Jupier like planet (did I mention that I like that result...?)
the California-Carnegie-AAT team has several more long period jovians, possibly with low eccentricity orbits.
Looking at known planet hosts, 179 stars, 25 are known already to have second planets (including 5 triples and 2 quads) and 35 are showing long term velocity trends consistent with giant planets in long period orbits.
They see many indications or resonant coupling between planets in the multiple systems (I recall 1/4 of the planets being in mean…
catdynamics | June 28, 2007There have been several interesting items at the Extreme Solar Systems conference here in Santorini
I think the surprise announcement from the California exoplanets groups that they have a genuine Jupiter analog - a Jupiter mass planet in a long period, low eccentricity orbit, very similar to our own Jovian - is a key, and long awaited, discover.
The Swiss group has 12 new planets, several with long ( > 2000 day) orbital period and apparent low eccentricities.
They are seeing a deficit of planets with 10-100d orbital periods, which is interesting, things are piling up at multi-year periods…
catdynamics | June 27, 2007Petros M. Nomikos conference center in Fira, Santorini is a very nice medium capacity facility (~ 200 for the main room, which we are filling)
Well worth a visit, if you're planning a small meeting.
I forgot to bring my camera, but MacPro has a small built in web-cam...
View to Firastefani west from the conference center. Main town center of Fira is east of the conference center, about 10 minutes walk along the cliff - everything, except the beach, is about 10 minutes walk, depending on your walking speed on the vertical...
Caldera from the conference center balcony to the west, at sunset.…
catdynamics | June 27, 2007Iranian news agency is reporting that the Bushehr nuclear power station is going online in October 2007
That is interesting.
It means the reports earlier that the fuel was delivered quietly by the Russians was accurate and they must be loading the reactor starting right now, if they want to be running in 3-4 months.
It also means that people who are paranoid about Busherh being used to breed weapons grade plutonium 239 from fuel grade low enriched uranium are going to get extra paranoid over the next 3-9 months. By november it would be dangerously late to "do" anything about Bushehr, and if…
catdynamics | June 26, 2007the long rumoured planet candiate around a nearby white dwarf has finally been made public
Fergal Mullally (U Texas) announced that they have strong evidence for a 2+ Jupiter mass planet around the white dwarf GD66 - a pulsating moderate temperature hydrogen white dwarf that is about 50 pc away.
Detection was through timing of pulsations, over a period of few years they have significant non-monotonic timing variation consistent with a planet in a circular 4 year orbit (or somewhat period longer if eccentric) - probably have to wait for JWST for imaging confirmation, but timing will verify,…