AP Biology Jason Cushman
Current Event 8 review 11/17/15
The Los Angeles Times article “Scientists think they just found the most important planet outside our solar system” by Deborah Netburn describes the recent finding of a planet known as GJ 1132b. This planet is one of the only earth-like planets close enough to the Earth, only 39 light years away, for astronomers to study it. This planet is the closest planet with a rocky exoplanet and is only 16% larger than earth. Scientists discovered this planet using the MEarth-South Observatory in Chile. This Harvard owned group of eight 16-inch wide robotic telescopes is constantly looking for nearby exoplanets, planets with a hard exterior or crust like earth. These telescopes look at nearby stars and look for dimming of the stars that signifies a planet has passed in front of it. . They first saw GJ 1132b in May of 2014 and since have begun studying the planet and have found out a few basic measurements. They measured the size using information of how much dimming is observed by the telescopes. They were also able to measure the measure the weight of the planet by observing the “wobble” of the star which is created by the gravitational pull of the planet. They then calculated the density of the planet and believe it to be primarily rock and metal similar to earth. They also calculated by using the number of dim periods per day that GJ 1132b orbits its host star every 1.6 earth days and is therefore roughly 1.4 million miles away from its host star. This has led scientists to believe that the temperature of GJ 1132b is roughly 500 degrees Fahrenheit due to its close proximity to the planet and therefore will not have liquid water on the surface. Many scientists including Zachory Berta-Thompson a post-doc from MIT’s Kavli Institute for Astrophysics and Space Research are excited for what this discovery will bring in the future. He mentions that a new powerful telescope, the James Webb Space Telescope, will be launched in October of 2018. He summarizes scientists excitement by stating“ The discovery of this planet gives us the opportunity to switch our focus from imagining what is out there to testing our theories observationally.”
Scientists for years have been trying to find other earthlike planets to study and have had little success. Most are either too far or just gaseous blobs. The discovery of GJ 1132b is so important because it could lead to an unknown number of discoveries about space, planets in general, and most importantly our planet. We don’t know what it will tell us but we can be sure that we will learn a lot from this planet. Scientists are especially interested in discovering more information about how rocky planets form, how they get into their orbits, and what is occurring on them every day. This could lead to discoveries about the history of our planet and more information on what has occurred here since its creation. This planet could also lead to the discovery of new life which scientists would be able to learn from and some of this information could be applied to life on earth.
This article was extremely interesting and contained a lot of well organized pieces of information. It also incorporated many quotes from multiple astronomers and astrophysicists. I learned a lot but felt like even more detail could have been added especially in the area of what the significance of this discovery is. In the beginning the author quotes Drake Deming who and states “he described the new world as ‘arguably the most important planet ever found outside the solar system’” but there is very little explanation of why. I think an important area that Netburn missed was the discussion on the potential for life on this planet. She briefly mentions the topic but I feel that a discussion of the potential for life would be something many people would want to read. Overall this was a very well written article which I enjoyed and learned a lot from despite a couple flaws.
Netburn, Deborah. "Scientists Think They Just Found the Most Important Planet outside Our Solar System." Los Angeles Times. Los Angeles Times, 11 Nov. 2015. Web. 17 Nov. 2015. <http://www.latimes.com/science/sciencenow/la-sci-sn-earth-like-planet-20151110-story.html>.
Jason,
ReplyDeleteI thought your review of Netburn’s article “Scientists think they just found the most important planet outside our solar solar” was really interesting. It had a nice summary of all the experiments that were done on GJ 1132b for them to find out about the terrestrial aspect of the planet. Also, your incorporation of the quote by scientist Zachory Berta-Thompson made the review credible and added dimension to the piece overall. Your critique of the article itself was very good because it went further beyond what was said in the article and questioned why it didn’t talk about the potential for life. Lastly, I thought it was very well written, as it gave some facts like how it’s 1.4million miles away from its host star and that it’s 500 degrees Fahrenheit.
There’s not much missing from the review, but it would have been nice to know about why it’s such an important discovery. I’m pretty sure the reason why it can’t sustain life is because of how hot it is there, but if it’s such an important planet, why have we not hear as much about it? When the moon was discovered to contain water, there was so much buzz about that, but I only heard of GJ 1132b from this review. I think you could have just proofread your piece first because few of the sentences had extra word in it and stuff.
Overall, I thought you did a nice job, and it does seem like an important discovery as it, like you said, can tell us about the past and the creation of our solar systems. Also, it can lead to more discoveries about the formation of rocky planets and about the essentials of life.
Netburn, Deborah. "Scientists Think They Just Found the Most Important Planet outside Our Solar System." Los Angeles Times. Los Angeles Times, 11 Nov. 2015. Web. 17 Nov. 2015. .
Great review Jason! You gave a good summary-- it was cohesive and easy to understand, while also giving all the important information and covering all the points of the article. Additionally, your explanations were well written. I really understood the science and calculations that went into studying this newfound planet and how revolutionary this new discovery is. Another great point of your review was the quote you included at the end of the first paragraph. This quote from an important scientist was a strong part that summarized the article and put it into perspective nicely.
ReplyDeleteWhile you had so many strengths in this review, there’s always something to work on! In your case, I think you could try to evaluate the author and the source of the article, The Los Angeles Times. Also, I think you could have gone more into depth about the significance of this discovery. You were pretty vague on this because there are so many specific potential benefits from this new knowledge!
The most interesting thing to me in this article was just the idea of a new planet that is similar to Earth being found! It had seemed to me that scientists had all but given up on the search for new planets with the potential for life, yet here it is! The calculations that went into studying the planet were astounding to me and the process for this study was also fascinating. I hope to read more about this new discovery and any new knowledge that we can gain from it.
Netburn, Deborah. "Scientists Think They Just Found the Most Important Planet outside Our Solar System." Los Angeles Times. Los Angeles Times, 11 Nov. 2015. Web. 17 Nov. 2015. .
Netburn, Deborah. "Scientists Think They Just Found the Most Important Planet outside Our Solar System." Los Angeles Times. Los Angeles Times, 11 Nov. 2015. Web. 17 Nov. 2015. .
ReplyDeleteAwesome job with this review, Jason! You summarized everything clearly and seemingly with ease, covering all of the main points of the article without including any extraneous details. Not only that, but you were able to establish a connection to how this topic affects human beings today, something that many people struggle with in these current events. The possibility of discovering new forms of life in outer space is incredible, and would most definitely affect everyone on earth’s lives. It would open up an entire new enormous field of study, for we would of course need to try to communicate with them, or possibly defend against them if they are a threat, or many other things. Thirdly, your writing style was very easy to read and follow, yet remained extremely informative. This is an extremely hard quality to find in nonfiction writings, which are usually either much oversimplified or much overcomplicated; this hints at a real knack you have for writing intellectual reviews!
Jason, it's so hard to think of any area which could benefit from improvement! But if anything, you may benefit from some more outside information in general. I’m still not fully clear on how the scientists were able to “measure the weight of the planet by observing the ‘wobble’ of the star”- how exactly is ‘wobble’ measured, and how does it correlate to planet weight? Secondly, although the style itself was great, the professionalism of the article could have been improved by proofreading the writing to make sure all grammar mistakes are dealt with. Although the mistakes are not numerous and overall not too significant, better writing would have just legitimized your argument and made it stronger.
But on the whole, this review was astounding. Your writing and analysis blew me away. It really taught me a lot about what it takes to detect and study new planets in far outer space, a topic I was aware of before but not very knowledgeable about. After reading this, I'll be sure to pay closer attention to astronomical advancements of this type, especially pertaining to the GJ 1132b. Of course, this also forces me to remember that there is always room for improvement, and that no progress in any field is ever truly completed; why stop at our solar system when you can venture 39 light years away?!Overall, I chose this article because of my lack of knowledge of the topic, and am extremely glad that this is the one I read. Thanks, Jason, for giving me such a great read!