Newscientist.com recently featured an article on the discovery of an ‘ocean planet’ – an extra solar planet filled water in the constellation of Libra. This planet is orbiting a red dwarf.
The planetary system around the small red dwarf star Gliese 581 boasts four planets. The newly discovered planet "e" (left, foreground) weighs about 1.9 Earths; "b" (nearest the star) weighs 16 Earths; "c" (centre) weighs 5 Earths; and "d" (bluish planet farthest from the star) weighs 7 Earths. "D" orbits its star in 66.8 days, while "e" completes an orbit in just 3.2 (Illustration: ESO/L Calçada)
This information as usual kindles my curiosity to seek parallels in astrology, for, there is nothing that is not covered by astrology. And astrology does give clues on where to see for planets or celestial bodies that have scope for growth and sustenance.
Accordingly, only two constellations have maximum potential for ‘growth’, while such potential varies in lesser degrees for other constellations.
The ‘growth’ is interpreted as growth in literal terms, meaning, giving rise to offspring! We call this as ‘progeny’ when we apply it to individuals. The 2 constellations for ‘growth’ are Gemini and Libra!
Gemini is in the outer rim of our Milky way galaxy and is brimming with activity by generating new stars! Gemini is the constellation featuring many twin-stars which are young. This is the area of the galaxy where ‘growth’ is happening. The Milky Way’s new children are born here! Astrologically speaking, Gemini stands as testimony for ‘procreation’ or ‘progeny’!
(In this context let me recall my earlier post on ‘par-vaaha vaayu’ that churns our galaxies! The churning is happening at outer rim of galaxies. Newer star systems are born in the outer whereas the older ones are found in the centre of galaxies. http://jayasreesaranathan.blogspot.com/2008/12/why-do-galaxies-spiral-wisdom-from.html )
Libra comes in the category of Gemini in astrology. That means it must also have in its depth formations that are conducive for ‘growth’ or procreation of newer stars!
The current findings are about water in a planet that is orbiting a red dwarf!
The presence of water can not ensure biological life, because astrologically this constellation is the area of growth in numbers, as how it happens in Gemini!
The planet in the system of a reed dwarf is indicative of what is in store for it in millions of years’ time.
The red dwarf is indicative of a system in its last leg of life. Anytime in cosmic time scale, this system will lose stability, by becoming a red giant and then a supernova.
At that time any new arrangement or re-alignment that would take place as a result, will have a better combination for ‘growth’ with water component in them.
This can be logical conclusion of a formation in the constellation of Libra, as deduced astrologically. We can not hope to find ‘life’ or expect ‘life’ to evolve in distant future in this part of the sky. This is an airy constellation that can only allow things to fly ‘astray’!
On the other hand, if the researchers train their eyes in Cancer, Pisces and Scorpio, they may stumble upon some exciting features that can support life to grow and thrive. Such systems may even be stable for a considerable time for life to evolve and sustain.
One may ask if astrology indicates that we can spot life in those places.
No, not when we are around and not in the way we can perceive!
Perhaps these constellations may throw up habitable zones for our future generations after millions of years. The present breed of human beings (manvanthra) will be replaced by another breed (next manvanthra) when our sun will have a rendezvous with his shadow-companion, ‘Chaaya’. The resultant formation will become the place for continuance of human race. Like this the continuity goes on for a minimum of 4 times. (I am saying this based on how it is explained in Puranas about the formation of future manvanthras.) The constellations mentioned above may become the anchor posts for future life at those times.
Among them, Scorpio is fiery and older as it is close to the centre of Milky Way.
Pisces is outside our galaxy.
So, Cancer is the best bet, as it is nearer home!
-jayasree
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From
Sibling worlds may be wettest and lightest known
A planet orbiting a red dwarf star 20 light years away could be the first known water world, entirely covered by a deep ocean.
The planet, named Gliese 581d, is not a new discovery, but astronomers have now revised its orbit inwards, putting it within the "habitable zone" where liquid water could exist on the surface. "It is the only low-mass planet known inside the habitable zone", says Michel Mayor of Geneva Observatory.
Mayor and his team used the European Southern Observatory's 3.6-metre telescope in
That turned up the faint footprints of four planets, since the orbiting planets make the star wobble slightly, giving its light a slight Doppler shift. Three of the planets had been identified previously.
The outermost planet had been thought to have a period of 83 days, putting it too far away from the small star's gentle heat to bear liquid water. But that was a mistake. "We only had a limited number of observations", Mayor told New Scientist. Now with three times as much data, he finds an orbital period of 66 days, putting the planet closer to its star – about a quarter of the Earth-Sun distance – and just inside the red dwarf's habitable zone.
New class
Gliese 581d is about seven times as massive as Earth, so it is much too small to be a gas giant like Jupiter, but probably too big to be a rocky world like our own. "Around such a small star, it is very difficult to have so much rocky material at such a [large] distance," says Mayor. Instead, the planet is likely to have a makeup similar to Neptune or Uranus, which are dominated by ices of water, ammonia and methane.
In the warmth of the habitable zone, these substances should form a sea thousands of kilometres deep. "Maybe this is the first of a new class of ocean planets. That is my favourite interpretation," says Mayor. "Whether there is life or not, I don't know."
The same set of observations also revealed a new world, Gliese 581e, with only 1.9 times the mass of Earth. That is the lowest published mass of any exoplanet around a normal star – although preliminary results have hinted that another exoplanet may weigh just 1.4 Earth masses. Gliese 581e is very close to the star, however, and probably far too hot for liquid water.
The results were announced on Tuesday at the European Week of Astronomy and Space Science meeting in
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Related post:-
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gliese_581_d
