The expression "irony of fate" is the first that comes to mind in this case. The guy who "killed" Pluto is the same as ten years later, would the discovery of a new planet in the solar system - this time a real one, larger than Earth, and not a dwarf planet, like Pluto. But when it comes to this subject, Mike Brown, you can replace "irony" and "destiny" by "obstinacy" and "focus."
"Actually, all this was an ongoing process," he explained Caltech astronomer (California Institute of Technology), in an interview with SUPER. "I'm looking for this planet for 20 years, and Pluto was just collateral damage along the way."
The old ambition of Brown, about to become reality, it was never a secret to anyone in the astronomical community. "Mike was always determined to find planets. He created and developed methods for this," says astronomer Cássio Leandro Barbosa, the FEI University Center, in São Bernardo do Campo (SP).
It was precisely this technological tour de force, perfecting the techniques involved in the discovery of faint objects located in the boondocks of the solar system, which took Brown in October 2003 to discover Eris - an object the size of Pluto, at that time still recognized officially as the ninth planet, despite having only 70% of the diameter of the Moon.
The finding has forced the International Astronomical Union (IAU) to take action. Or Eris would be confirmed as the tenth planet, or the very definition of what a planet should change.
It was a discussion that already took shape was a decade when astronomers began to discover a number of other objects that reside in the same region of space as Pluto, the Kuiper Belt - a multitude of small stars living in the confines of the solar system, beyond Neptune's orbit. Pluto, it seemed, it was the only ruler from these little ones. After Eris, not even that.
Brown was convinced that Pluto no longer deserve planet status. But he also thought it would be lacking courage to the old men of the IAU (a kind of Fifa astronomy) to propose the change and thus target Pluto, the only planet in the solar system discovered by an American (Clyde Tombaugh in 1930). Brown then defended an intermediate solution, in which Pluto, for cultural reasons, would continue to be referred to as a "historic" planet. Incidentally, the planet Eris would become 10, and Brown would your planet. "Yeah, I just did not think that astronomers would have the courage to demote Pluto, so I was trying to find a way to be OK," admits the researcher. "But the actual outcome was much better!"
And what was it? In a vote among its members, IAU decided that, to be planet, an object must fulfill three requirements: orbit the sun, be roughly spherical and be the dominant object in its orbit. Pluto passes in the first two categories, but neither he nor Eris qualify in the third, as they are just large rocks in a belt full of stones (or so) smaller. Subsequently: both were included in the brand new category of "dwarf planets" or "planetoids", composed of objects that fill only the first two requirements
Replacement in the solar system: Pluto comes out, comes a giant with a mass 10 times greater than Earth's
Throughout his hunt for new worlds, and Eris, Brown also ended up discovering a handful of other dwarf planets, objects that may well be labeled as the lost cousins Pluto. Take note of some of them: Sedna, Quaoar, Makemake and Haumea.
In 2010, astronomer published an autobiographical book with a suggestive title: "How I killed Pluto and why he deserved" (How I Killed Pluto and Why It Had It Coming). Brown seemed pleased with the idea of going down in history as the killer of a planet. But in fact, this was only the beginning of next adventure. By providing the miracle of the discovery of objects in the Kuiper Belt, Brown inspired other astronomers to pay more attention to these objects. And they began to notice the following: some of these newly discovered stars had a trajectory beyond weird. Literally "there" and literally "weird": their trajectories were very elliptical (oval) and sometimes took them far from the region considered as the Kuiper Belt.
It was almost like ... almost like there was something big over there, pulling the planetoids with their gravity.
Oops. Wait a second. That "something big" could be another planet. That's what Brown proposed in January 2016. In partnership with his fellow Caltech, Konstantin Batygin, Mike introduced the world to a categorical prediction: should even be a ninth planet in the Solar System, disrupting traffic of planetoids.
According to the calculations made by the duo, its perihelion - the closest approach of the Sun - would be 200 astronomical units away. An astronomical unit (AU) is what separates the Earth from the sun: 150 million kilometers. Pluto, so you have an idea, it is a mere 35 UAs here. But the aphelion, the maximum distance would be 1,200 AUs. A cosmic madness. But the fact is: a planet with this orbit, and mass about ten times that of Earth, mathematically explain the mysterious phenomena of the Kuiper Belt.
And most importantly, it suggests the existence of a planet with new features to our system. This mass ten times that of Earth would put in an intermediate range between the highest rocky (this little planet here beneath your feet) and the smallest of gas (Neptune, whose mass gives 17 times ours). He would then be something like a Super-Earth, or mininetuno, if you will. Another insanity: to complete one orbit around the Sun, it would take between 10,000 and 20,000 years - Neptune closes a return in 165 years; Pluto in 248.
On the day of the announcement, Brown admitted to Science magazine that his statements were bold. "If you say, 'we have evidence for the planet as' almost all astronomers say,' This again? These guys are clearly crazy." I would say that too. But then why is it different now? It's different because this time we are right. "
The reason for such belief is pragmatic. The accounts of Brown himself, imagine that this mutual distortion is not caused by a hypothetical planet means accepting a coincidence whose chance of happening is estimated at less than 0.007%. It is this number that gives confidence to Brown that that he met - at least in theory - a new planet.
This type of detection, indirect, has a strong precedent: in the 19th century, Neptune was found because of something - the gravitational influence that it caused the orbit of Uranus. This detection until they found the planet using telescope was a leap.
Now it's different. Brown's calculations do not show that part of its orbit the planet 9 would be at this point, so there is no way to know where to point the telescope to find it. Even so, in addition to conducting their own observation effort to hunt the hidden planet, he wants to engage the world astronomers in the search.
"I would love to find it," says Brown. "But also I would be very happy if someone else found him. That is why we are publishing [the results, published in a scientific paper in the journal Astronomical Journal]. Our bet is that this will inspire others to look for the planet."
The results appear solid. "Really they have strong evidence that distant objects have orbits presenting a strange alignment," says astronomer Rodney Gomes of the National Observatory. "It is more than reasonable to think that there is an external factor causing this, and the existence of a planet seems to be the best explanation. In fact, I see no other."
Echoing this lack of alternative explanation, most of the time, Brown is confident that his planet end up being discovered. But like all scientists, it is impossible that he did not give up sometimes to a frightening thought: what if he's wrong?
Asked if this goose bumps is scary or nice, Mike Brown Trading "or" by "and". "Nice and scary," he says. "Feeling 100% convinced in some days and some nights, totally terrified to lose sleep." When (and if) the planet der 9 faces in any telescope, Mike's nights will no longer be unsettled. It will be a well-deserved sleep.
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