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Six billion tonnes a second: Rogue planet found growing at record rate (www.eso.org)

submitted 4 weeks ago by kalkulat@lemmy.world to c/astronomy@lemmy.world

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"(ESO’s VLT) reveals that this free-floating planet is eating up gas and dust from its surroundings at a rate of six billion tonnes a second. This is the strongest growth rate ever recorded for a rogue planet, or a planet of any kind...."

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[–] idiomaddict@lemmy.world 4 points 4 weeks ago* (last edited 4 weeks ago) (1 children)

According to Wikipedia, it only needs to be 80 times as massive:

Jupiter would need to be about 80 times as massive to fuse hydrogen and become a star.[8]

Six billion tons a second ends up as an increase of about seven orders of magnitude lower than jupiters mass in a year, so it’s still several millions of years away from that point, assuming linear growth. I see no reason to assume linear growth, but this is probably still not going to happen in the foreseeable future.

[–] Treczoks@lemmy.world 4 points 4 weeks ago (2 children)

OK, different source, different numbers. I thought I had a good source.

I disagree on the millions of years in the future, though: the more mass it gets, the faster it acquires more, so this is more exponential than linear. It won't be anytime soon, yes, but maybe faster than you think.

[–] idiomaddict@lemmy.world 2 points 4 weeks ago (1 children)

Yeah, I agree it’s definitely not going to be linear growth, but I don’t think any potential great grandchildren of ours will live to see it.

[–] Treczoks@lemmy.world 2 points 4 weeks ago

Agreed, they won't. By far. Maybe even humans won't see it lighting up.

[–] Olhonestjim@lemmy.world 2 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

But also the bigger it gets, the faster it clears its orbit, so the slower it grows.

[–] Treczoks@lemmy.world 1 points 3 weeks ago

Interesting aspect, yes. Now we need someone with the right simulation tools who can run this for a better answer.