fromwww.scientificamerican.com
3 days agoScientists Just Clocked a Rogue' Planet the Size of Saturn
In a new study published in Science on Thursday, scientists show how they measured the mass of one such rogue planet for the first timea breakthrough that could enable further studies of these strange lonely worlds. Instead of looking at the planet's orbit, the research team, led by Subo Dong of Peking University, instead analyzed how the planet's gravity bent the light from a distant star, in a so-called microlensing event, from two separate vantage points: Earth and the now-retired Gaia space observatory.