The Planet Factory: Exoplanets and the Search for a Second Earth

325 Pages·2017·3.65 MB·English

by  Elizabeth Tasker

Also available in the Bloomsbury Sigma series:
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Shira Teitel Suspicious Minds by Rob Brotherton Herding Hemingway’s Cats by
Kat Arney Electronic Dreams by Tom Lean
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Earth by Jules Howard
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Durrani and Liz Kalaugher Built on Bones by Brenna Hassett
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4th Rock from the Sun by Nicky Jenner Patient H69 by Vanessa Potter
Catching Breath by Kathryn Lougheed PIG/PORK by Pía Spry-Marqués
To my parents, with whom I was furious from the age of eight for not noticing
my initials would be E.T.
... I admit it paid off.

Contents
Preface
Introduction: The Blind Planet Hunters
PART 1: THE FACTORY FLOOR
Chapter 1: The Factory Floor
Chapter 2: The Record-breaking Building Project
Chapter 3: The Problem with Gas
Chapter 4: Air and Sea
PART 2: DANGEROUS PLANETS
Chapter 5: The Impossible Planet
Chapter 6: We Are Not Normal
Chapter 7: Water, Diamonds or Lava? The Planet Recipe Nobody Knew
Chapter 8: Worlds Around Dead Stars
Chapter 9: The Lands of Two Suns
Chapter 10: The Planetary Crime Scene
Chapter 11: Going Rogue
PART 3: GOLDILOCKS WORLDS
Chapter 12: The Goldilocks Criteria
Chapter 13: The Search for Another Earth
Chapter 14: Alien Vistas
Chapter 15: Beyond the Goldilocks Zone
Chapter 16: The Moon Factory
Chapter 17: The Search for Life
Glossary
Further Reading
Acknowledgements
Index
Preface
Figure 1 Our Solar System. ‘Astronomical units’ (au) are used to compare the immense distances between
the planets. 1au is the distance from the Earth to the Sun. (Due to the huge size difference between the
terrestrial and gas giants, this image is not to scale.)
In the early 1990s, we knew of eight planets:
Mercury,
Venus,
Earth,
Mars,
Jupiter,
Saturn,
Uranus,
Neptune.
And the dwarf planets, Ceres (within the asteroid belt) and Pluto (within the
Kuiper belt).
The first four are the terrestrial planets, with rocky surfaces and thin
atmospheres. The next four are the gas giants, 15–300 times more massive and