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back to article Excitement in boffinry circles as GIGANTIC ALIEN RING BLOTS OUT SUN

The first planetary ring system outside of our Solar System has been spotted and it's massive – in fact, it's 120 million kilometers in diameter. "This planet is much larger than Jupiter or Saturn, and its ring system is roughly 200 times larger than Saturn's rings are today," said Eric Mamajek, professor of physics and …

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  1. dan1980

    "The mass of the ring system is roughly equivalent to the total mass of Earth, if our world was ground up small and put into orbit around the unnamed, faraway giant planet."

    A clue to its formation?

    Perhaps cosmic punishment by His Noodliness? Time to get saved.

    1 0 Reply
    1. Mark 85
      Reply Icon

      I'm thinking it's the other way... His Noodliness is creating something using a galactic Mixmaster.

      1 0 Reply
      1. TheOtherHobbes
        Reply Icon

        [wacka wacka wacka parp]

        But wait - this is all based on a single light curve measured in 2007. The estimated orbital period is at least ten years, so there will be no more data until later in the decade at the very earliest.

        "With simple assumptions on ring geometry and the ring plane orientation, this ring model reproduces many but not all of the nightly photometric light curves. These discrepancies imply either an error in the determined geometry of the ring plane, and/or the rings are not coplanar. Further modeling with additional degrees of freedom for the rings, such as warping and precession may lead to better fits to the photometric data."

        So it's debatable if this model is actually stable. Or if maybe something else is happening to affect the light curve.

        It's all very interesting.

        1 0 Reply
    2. Just Enough
      Reply Icon
      Boffin

      1 Gusaf = 1 ring system with the mass of Earth.

      This is just a new Register unit of measurement for mass that can also be pressed into service as a unit of volume. Call it the GUSAF (Ground up small and faraway).

      We need a conversion to swimming pools before it can be properly utilized though.

      3 0 Reply
  2. Martin Budden Silver badge
    Pint

    "glommed"

    What a lovely word. Thank you. Have a virtual beer on me.

    0 0 Reply
  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Er....

    I came here thinking this might be related to Kim Kardashian's bum. I guess my mind is in the wrong place today.

    1 0 Reply
    1. Elmer Phud
      Reply Icon

      Re: Er....

      You wouldn't want to get too close to your subject.

      It has a high gravitational pull which is howit seems to keep getting bigger and bigger.

      The hope is that it will collapse soon and draw in all the fawners, 'journalists', TV intervewers etc.etc. and eventually disappear up its own wormhole.

      0 0 Reply
  4. Neil Barnes Silver badge
    Alien

    if our world was ground up small and put into orbit

    Er, I'd rather you didn't. I'm still using it.

    Thank you.

    5 0 Reply
    1. dan1980
      Reply Icon

      Re: if our world was ground up small and put into orbit

      It'd solve more than a few of my problems. Only way to be sure, I reckon.

      The other day I had a magnificent hangover and if you'd given me the option of having the world transported 30 quintillion lg away, ground up, then distributed across 540 quintillion nW, I would have been hard-pressed to refuse.

      1 0 Reply
    2. VinceH
      Reply Icon

      Re: if our world was ground up small and put into orbit

      I was wondering if it's the other way around - that the Magratheans collected up all that matter and used it for the construction of Earth. Having checked, though, it seems J1407 is only 420 light years away - I'm fairly certain Earth is a bit older than 420 years.

      Although I suppose the Magratheans could have taken that material in the last 420 years, then moved it through time to make this planet further in the past.

      1 0 Reply
      1. Elmer Phud
        Reply Icon

        Re: if our world was ground up small and put into orbit

        I lurve Bill Nighy's work on the fijords.

        2 0 Reply
  5. Bunbury
    Alien

    I for one

    welcome our enormously ringed overlords

    0 0 Reply
  6. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    62 moons on saturn?

    Beware the tides of 1:03:27PM.

    I bet the almanacs cost a fortune.

    0 0 Reply
  7. PassiveSmoking
    Mushroom

    Installation 04?

    Just so long as it actually is a ring system and not a Halo.

    0 0 Reply
  8. teebie

    Nice picture

    1 0 Reply
  9. Dave Lawton
    Coat

    Rings, not a single ring ?

    Come back Louis Wu, all is forgiven.

    0 0 Reply

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