A recent study in Japan finally explained the purpose behind Uranus' mysterious traits, including its tilt and the ring system. Scientists suggest that Uranus' axis of rotation and the unusual residences of its moons and ring system are likely due to an ancient massive icy impact.

Uranus
(Photo : Pixabay)

A studies crew led by Professor Shigeru Ida from the Earth-Life Science Institute at Tokyo Institute of Technology studied the planet with an unusual set of properties. They arrived in the conclusion as they constructed a laptop simulation of moon formation across the icy worlds.

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Mystery solved

Uranus has been known as a tiny icy planet and left scientists clueless for a long time. While most planets rotate around the Sun in the same route with their poles at 90 degrees to the axis of revolvement, Uranus is tilted over approximately 98 degrees with a ring just like Saturn. It has 27 moons that orbit the planet around its equator.

In a statement, Ida said that the model in the research is the "first to explain the configuration of Uranus' moon tool." He added that this new research would help the scientists understand the configuration of other icy planets in the Solar System together with Neptune.

Ida also stated, "Beyond this, astronomers have now found hundreds of planets around different stars, so-referred to as exoplanets, and observations advocate that many of the newly discovered planets called super-Earths in exoplanetary systems can also consist largely of water ice and this model also can be applied to these planets."

 

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Planet with temperature exceeding 2,400 degrees Celcius

While this study in Japan was about icy worlds, a crew of astronomers has observed a distant exoplanet where it rains liquid iron.

According to findings published in the journal Nature, the Earth is called WASP 76b. It is estimated to be located 640-light-years far from Earth. The group of scientists led with the aid of professor David Ehrenreich studied the chemistry of the planet by using the Echelle Spectrograph for Rocky Exoplanets and Stable Spectroscopic Observations (ESPRESSO) on the European Southern Observatory Very Large Telescope (VLT) located on Cerro Paranal, Chile.

According to the research, WASP 76b orbits so near its host celebrity, which is Sun for planet Earth. That sunlight hour heats at the exoplanet for more than 2,400 degrees Celcius, hot sufficient to vaporize metals. However, the nighttime temperatures at the exoplanet fall by a whopping 1,000 degrees, allowing the metal to condense and rain out. The research says that the exoplanet is so near its host big name that it takes just 48 hours to finish one revolution. In contrast, the Earth takes twelve months and 5 hours to complete one revolution across the Sun.

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