Scientists observing the planetary system of one star Kepler-107, noticed a couple of planets that are so different from each other that this difference may indicate a major collision.
These planets, first discovered in 2014, revolve around a star called Kepler-107, along with two more planetary companions. These two inner planets, Kepler-107b and c, are about the same size, and in this new study, scientists headed by Aldo S. Bonomo set out to determine their masses.
The Kepler space telescope, through which the planets Kepler-107b and c were discovered, uses the so-called transit method, based on measurements of the periodic blackouts of a star caused by the passage of an exoplanet in front of it. Another common search method for exoplanets is the method of radial velocities, which consists in measuring the weak radial displacements of a star, caused by the influence of the gravity of a nearby planet on it. It is this second method that was used in the new work to obtain information about the masses of the planets, previously discovered with the help of Kepler.
The analysis carried out by the authors showed that there is a key difference between the parameters of the studied planets, which consists in the densities of the matter of the planets – although these two neighboring planets have approximately the same dimensions, the density of the substance of one of them is approximately twice the density of the material of the second planet. In addition, the denser planet is farther from the star than the less dense – which is a very uncharacteristic configuration for most planetary systems. Researchers who obtained data on this imbalance, note that these findings may be a sign indicating a giant collision, as a result of which one of the planets lost their lighter shells.
Signs of a giant collision in a different planetary system Kepler-107
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