exomoons

This artist’s impression shows a gas giant exoplanet orbiting a sun-like star, exemplified by Kepler-1625b. Credit: NASADiscovery of giant exomoons around the planets Kepler-1625b and Kepler-1708b called into question.Just as it can be assumed that the stars in our Milky Way are orbited by planets, moons around these exoplanets should not be uncommon. This makes it all the more difficult to detect them. So far, only two of the more than 5300 known exoplanets have been found to have moons. A new data analysis now…

The moon crashing into Earth may sound like an unrealistic doomsday scenario or the stuff of sci-fi disasters. But for some planets in other star systems, such catastrophic collisions may be common. New research published in the journal Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Societyuses computer simulations to show that collisions between exoplanets and their moons (called exomoons) may actually be a regular occurrence, which could be disastrous for any budding alien life on those planets. While astronomers have yet…