Astronomers Identify 27 Potential
“Tatooine-like” Circumbinary Planets
¨ Astronomers have
identified 27 candidate planets that may orbit two stars, a configuration known
as a circumbinary system. Such planets are often called “Tatooine-like” planets
because they circle a pair of stars, similar to the fictional planet Tatooine
in the Star Wars series.
Circumbinary Planets
¨
Circumbinary planets are
exoplanets that revolve around two stars instead of one. The first confirmed
circumbinary planet was Kepler-16b, announced in 2011 by the Kepler Space
Telescope mission.
Binary Star Systems
¨
A binary star system
contains two stars bound by gravity and orbiting a common centre of mass.
Binary systems are common in the Milky Way, and many stellar systems in the
galaxy contain two or more stars.
Detection and Study of Exoplanets
¨ Exoplanets are planets outside the Solar System. Astronomers detect them through methods such as the transit method, radial velocity method, direct imaging, and gravitational microlensing.
