Anexoplanet astronomerhas created aGIFthat charts 250 geezerhood of planet sleuthing in just 60 seconds . It should derive as no surprise that the last couple of tenner have been rife with exoplanet discoveries as detection engineering has encourage . However , the GIF does more than just show the late exoplanet gold rush , it also compare the size and orbital distance of these planetary discoveries to our own solar organisation .
“ The idea of this plot of ground is to equate our own solar organization ( with planets plot in dark blue ) against the newly - discovered extrasolar globe , ” wroteHugh Osborn , the creator of the GIF , on his website . “ guess of this plot as a projection of all 1,873 worlds onto our own solar system , with the Sun ( and all other wizard ) at the far left . ”
quotation : Hugh Osborn .
Note : The first exoplanets were not discovered in the 1700s . Those benighted blasphemous dots are actually solar system planets that have been placed there for comparing . Here is a color cipher to help differentiate between the marks .
The horitzontal bloc ( x - axis ) measures the orbital period of a planet , which is how long it takes for the planet to orb around its star . The vertical axis ( yttrium - axis ) is merely the mass of the exoplanet in Earth masses .
Upon closer review , a few interesting patterns emerge . For example , the top leave alone is thick with orotund globe , or " hot Jupiters . " Even though they are comparatively rare , they are easy to find because they bring about a declamatory radiate speed by revolve so airless to their parent star .
“ The bottom radical is from the Kepler quad scope , " wrote Osborn . " This bunch is the only one that ’s really real and not just a systematic effect . This is because Kepler was capable of finding every eccentric of major planet down to ~1 Earth radius . So this clustering shows that there are more Earth and top-notch - Earth size planets than any other . Hopefully we can get down to poke into below it ’s boundary and into the Earth - like regime , where M more worlds should await ! "
