'Baby' planet named big news for '04

In a look back at the major space discoveries of 2004, the work of the Mars rovers certainly tops the list, but astronomers at the University have made the 2004 RedNova list with a planet discovery of their own.

In June, Dan Watson, professor of physics and astronomy, detected the youngest planet ever discovered, orbiting a star more than 420 light years away. The discovery was made using the new infrared Spitzer Space Telescope, which was partially developed by Rochester astronomers.

The planet cannot be seen directly, but Spitzer's Infrared Spectrograph instrument clearly showed that an area of dust in the disk around the star was missing, strongly suggesting the presence of a planet. Scientists know of only one phenomenon that can tunnel such a distinct "hole" in the disk during the short lifetime of the star--a planet at least 100,000 years old.

The baby planet so disrupted the current models of planet formation that many scientists assumed its discovery was an error. In November, Alice Quillen, assistant professor of physics and astronomy, and a team of theoretical astrophysicists at the University determined the minimum mass of the apparent planet.

Working from the original team's data, Rochester researchers revealed that the planet could be as small as Neptune and that it is also about the same distance from its parent star as our own Neptune is from the Sun. Most extrasolar planets discovered to date are much larger and orbit extremely close to their parent star.

The critical "eyes" of the infrared telescope were designed in part by physics and astronomy professors Judith Pipher, William Forrest, and Watson, a team that has been among the world leaders in opening the infrared window to the universe.

RedNova's list of 2004 achievements in space science can be seen at www.rednova. com/news/display/?id=116099.

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