Astronomers “cancels” Spock’s home planet

An international team of astronomers has refuted earlier statements about the existence of an exoplanet in the 40 Eridani system. The researchers came to this conclusion during a re-analysis of the star’s spectrum.

The 40 Eridani star system. Source: Robert Fealey

40 Eridana is located at a distance of 16 light-years from Earth, its age is estimated at 5.6 billion years. The system consists of three stars. Its main component is an orange dwarf, which can be seen in the earth’s sky with the naked eye. At a distance of 400 AU from it, there is a pair of white and red dwarfs. They make one orbit around the center of the system in 8 thousand years.

In 2018, a team of researchers announced the discovery of deviations in the radial velocity of the main component of the system. They interpreted this as evidence of the existence of an invisible companion. Its mass was estimated at 8.5 terrestrial, the period of circulation was 42 days.

The news about the discovery of an exoplanet attracted a lot of public attention. The fact is that according to the mythology of the cult series “Star Trek”, it is in the 40 Eridani system that the planet Vulcan is located, which is the birthplace of one of its main characters, Spock. The temperature and gravity on the Volcano are higher than on Earth, most of its surface consists of deserts and mountain ranges. Thus, the characteristics of the found exoplanet coincided quite well with the fictional world from the series.

Thus, the characteristics of the found exoplanet coincided quite well with the fictional world from the series. In a recent study, a group of scientists analyzed a list of discovered exoplanets to assess their importance for a more thorough study. During the analysis, astronomers drew attention to some inconsistencies in the 2018 data regarding 40 Eridani. In particular, they were surprised that the period of rotation of the exoplanet exactly corresponded to the period of rotation of the star.

Therefore, the researchers reanalyzed the spectrum of the main component 40 Eridani. It turned out that the deviations in the radial velocity of the star were most likely caused not by the presence of an exoplanet, but by activity on its own surface. Thus, astronomers refuted the conclusion of colleagues about the existence of a “Volcano”.

Earlier we talked about how astronomers “closed” an exoplanet in another triple star system.

According to https://phys.org

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