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Real Tatooine found.

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    Real Tatooine found.

    It's a real-life Tatooine. A spectacle made popular by the "Star Wars" saga — a planet with two suns — has now been confirmed in space for the first time, astronomers revealed.
    Scientists using NASA's Kepler space telescope captured details of a giant planet in orbit around the pair of binary stars that make up the Kepler-16 system, which is about 200 light-years away.
    "This discovery is stunning," said study co-author Alan Boss at the Carnegie Institute in Washington. "Once again, what used to be science fiction has turned into reality."
    When Tatooine was depicted on film, many scientists doubted that such planets could really exist. Now there's proof.
    "It's possible that there's a real Tatooine out there," said John Knoll, visual effects supervisor at the special-effects firm Industrial Light and Magic, which was behind the "Star Wars" films. "Kepler 16b is unambiguous and dramatic proof that planets really do form around binaries."
    The new discovery is expanding the bounds of what scientists, as well as filmakers, can conceive, he said.
    "Again and again we see that the science is stranger and cooler than fiction," Knoll said during a NASA press conference today. "The very existence of these discoveries gives us cause to dream bigger, to question our assumptions."
    The planet, dubbed Kepler-16(AB)-b, passes in front of both stars in view of the satellite, regularly dimming their light. Each star also eclipses its companion as they orbit each other. Altogether, these motions allow scientists to precisely calculate the masses, radii and trajectories of all three bodies.
    The newfound planet keeps a distance from its stars nearly three-quarters that of the distance between the Earth and the sun. It is somewhat like Saturn in size, although nearly 50 percent denser, suggesting it is richer in heavy elements.
    "Kepler-16(AB)-b is not habitable as we know it," said study lead author Laurance Doyle , an astrophysicist at the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI) Institute in Mountain View, Calif.
    This alien world travels on a nearly circular 229-day orbit around its two parent stars, Kepler-16A and Kepler-16B, which are about 69 and 20 percent as massive as the sun, respectively. The stars keep close to each other — only a fifth of the distance between Earth and the sun on average, which is closer than Mercury gets to the sun — completing an orbit around each other every 41 days, researchers added.

    Sweet. First Midnight, now Tatooine. What next....
    Id say colonize it under a big dome system then mine it for those heavier elements. At some point in the future. Although Zerka(<Correct me if I am wrong) mining corp tried that with Tatooine, but it was mineral poor.
    Any thoughts?
    Last edited by Gormagon; 16 September 2011, 05:35 PM.
    sigpicHe who controls the spice controls the universe!(And the kitchen.)

    If you enjoy Minecraft or have never played but like building and exploring please check out Craftyn.com and apply for roamer status on the server at http://www.craftyn.com/forms/2/respond It is a well modded towny type server with a strong core community and lots of mini games and events. My user name is TrueGormagon and you are welcome to join the great city of Eden, Craftyns oldest player made city. (2011)

    #2
    http://forum.gateworld.net/threads/8...g-binary-stars
    "A society grows great when old men plant trees, the shade of which they know they will never sit in. Good people do things for other people. That's it, the end." -- Penelope Wilton in Ricky Gervais's After Life

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      #3
      *Sigh.* I looked for it before I made the thread.....did not see it.
      sigpicHe who controls the spice controls the universe!(And the kitchen.)

      If you enjoy Minecraft or have never played but like building and exploring please check out Craftyn.com and apply for roamer status on the server at http://www.craftyn.com/forms/2/respond It is a well modded towny type server with a strong core community and lots of mini games and events. My user name is TrueGormagon and you are welcome to join the great city of Eden, Craftyns oldest player made city. (2011)

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        #4
        Yeah I saw this on TheForce.net it was incredible.
        1 “Let not your heart be troubled; you believe in God, believe also in Me. 2 In My Father’s house are many mansions; if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. 3 And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself; that where I am, there you may be also. 4 And where I go you know, and the way you know.”
        5 Thomas said to Him, “Lord, we do not know where You are going, and how can we know the way?”
        6 Jesus said to him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.

        John 14:1-6

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