Veliki broj novootkrivenih planeta

Naučnici su otkrili da u svemiru ima tri puta više zvezda nego što se ranije mislilo. Najnovije istraživanje, čiji su rezultati objavljeni u časopisu Nejčer (Priroda), dovodi do zaključka da bi na nekoj planeti, koja je na primer nalik Zemlji a nalazi se u jednom od planetarnih sistema povezanih sa novootkirvenim zvezdama, mogla živeti bića slična ljudima.

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Astronomers have assumed that the composition of all galaxies is the same as our own. But using a new, more powerful instrument on the Keck telescope in Hawaii, researchers have discovered that older galaxies contain twenty times more small dim stars, called 'red dwarves', than younger galaxies such as our own. Doctor Marek Kukula of the Royal Greenwich Observatory describes what the view from a planet in an older galaxy might be like.

"When one of these galaxies that we now know contain lots and lots of small red stars, it may well be true that the night sky is dotted with these small, faint red stars glowing like embers and that might produce a very pretty effect."

According to Professor Pieter van Dokkum of Yale University, the discovery also increases the estimate of the number of planets in the universe, and therefore makes it even more likely that there's life somewhere else in the cosmos.

"There's been particular attention recently to these red dwarf stars. In one galaxy there's about a trillion of these stars and there's hundreds of billions of these galaxies. Even if the planet is quite close to the star, you could have liquid water on the planet, because the star is not as bright as the sun and so a planet can be a lot closer and still be kind of balmy, rather than scorching hot."

The discovery that there are many more stars means that our universe is a much brighter, more crowded place than we previously thought.

Pallab Ghosh, BBC News

Čujte reči

astronomers
astronomi, naučnici koji se bave kosmosom i zvezdama

composition
materija

powerful instrument
veoma snažan (moćan) instrument

galaxies
galaksije, skupovi više miliona ili milijardi zvezda u svemiru

dotted with
istačkani, preplavljeni komadićima

glowing like embers
u ovom slučaju, zvezde koje gore narandžastim svetlom - kao da su ugalj ili drvo (nakon što se vatra već ugasila)

the cosmos
kosmos, svemir

balmy
prijatno, blago, ne previše toplo vreme

scorching hot
vrelo do granice prženja, toliko toplo da nijedna forma života ne može da preživi

universe
univerzum, kosmos, svemir sa svim planetama, uključujući i Zemlju