Hot Jupiters and there Moons

[gavino]

Man has found so many gas planets orbiting close to stars there most be some of these planets that have moons that could be like Earth. Right now man can not even begin finding such worlds but mybe in the next 20 years or so we can. Mybe there are more moons than planets that have life on them! It would be so cool to find one of these worlds.. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p><span style="font-style:italic" class="Apple-style-span">gavinovz</span></p><p> </p> </div>

 

[majornature]

If only we could travel to those moons and see what's really going on. It would be nice to finally meet someone other being from another planet. But until then we could only imagine.<br /><br /><b><font color="yellow"> True Knowledge Exists in Knowing That You Know NOTHING!!!!!!</font>/b></b> <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <font size="2" color="#14ea50"><strong><font size="1">We are born.  We live.  We experiment.  We rot.  We die.  and the whole process starts all over again!  Imagine That!</font><br /><br /><br /><img id="6e5c6b4c-0657-47dd-9476-1fbb47938264" style="width:176px;height:247px" src="http://sitelife.space.com/ver1.0/Content/images/store/14/4/6e5c6b4c-0657-47dd-9476-1fbb47938264.Large.jpg" alt="blog post photo" width="276" height="440" /><br /></strong></font> </div>

 

[ehs40]

i have thought that the planets we have discovered thus far would likely have moons with life as well because if u look here in our solar system our gas giants have many many moons, and why wouldnt extra solar gas giants not have moons, but only time will tell

 

[thalion]

Though I can't find the reference, I remember reading that if hot Jupiters migrated to their present locations from distant orbits, then it is unlikely that any major moons could have survived the tidal disruption as the planet got closer to the primary. These planets would have ridiculously small Hill spheres, and orbits would be semi-chaotic well inside even that.<br /><br />In short, if we're going to be looking for Earthlike moons, we should start with the distant Jovian analogues, and maybe the eccentric Jovians as well.

 

[ehs40]

first we need a good enoff telescope to do that but hopefully that will be soon

 

[ehs40]

unlikely but not impossible

 

[le3119]

Even the gas worlds (such as 70 Virginis) appear to describe more eliptical orbits than the worlds of our system, so any terrestrial moons would pass through a cycle of climatic extremes, maybe freezing, thawing and refreezing. The question is, can complex life like ours survive such cycles? It is disheartening that many of these hot Jupiters would disrupt a stable orbit in the star's "comfort zone".

 

[nexium]

I agree, highly eliptical means extreme temperature variations, and makes other planets between appogee and perigee very unlikely. Almost circular orbits, increase probability of intelegent life greatly. Neil