RE: Earth-Like Planet around Proxima?
August 13, 2016 at 10:36 am
(This post was last modified: August 13, 2016 at 10:37 am by AFTT47.)
(August 12, 2016 at 4:29 pm)Anomalocaris Wrote: Because the luminosity of star declines exponentially with star mass, the Goldilocks zone around a dwarve star would be in a much steeper part of the parent star's gravity well than the earth is on the sun's. So any planet in proxima centauri's Goldilocks zone won't be earth like: It is probably tidal locked to its parent star. One side is perpetually day, the other perpetually night.
I believe a planet in the Goldilocks zone of most K-type stars (cool, orangish stars typically half the mass of our sun) will probably be tidally locked but there is no question about it with a red dwarf. Perhaps even more significant though, that tidal effect will have all kinds of consequences on the planet's geology. I don't know if it's inevitable that the planet would end up like Jupiter's moon, Io but would think it would have to be allot more active than Earth.
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