RE: Supersized rocky planets are out there.
June 2, 2014 at 10:03 pm
(This post was last modified: June 2, 2014 at 10:03 pm by Heywood.)
(June 2, 2014 at 6:21 pm)Cthulhu Dreaming Wrote:(June 2, 2014 at 6:19 pm)Heywood Wrote: The Kepler space telescope was designed to be able to spot earth sized exo-planets.
Yes, I'm aware of that. I'm also aware that there are a number of other detection methods which aren't - which is why I asked the question.
ETA: It's an entirely separate matter as to whether or not earth-size/mass planets are *as easy* to identify as larger/more massive ones. In other words, are we finding fewer of them because they are fundamentally harder to detect - which they are.
If Kepler found fewer than expected there are two possible reasons:
A) Kepler's design was flawed.
B) Our models of the dynamics of solar system formation are wrong.