Page 34 - 20060708 - The 'X' Chronicles Newspaper - July/August 2006

34 Discovery of the Planets Discovery of the Planets 34 THE DISCOVERY OF affecting Mercury. THE DISCOVERY OF Leverrier never found Vulcan, but THE PLANETS THE PLANETS people believed it was there until 1916, when Einstein’s general theory of relativity was published. Einstein gave a satisfactory As early as kindergarten, we’re taught explanation for the discrepancies in Mercury’s that there are nine planets in the solar orbit, so scientists no longer needed Vulcan. It system. But 200years ago, even thereby ceased to exist... until decades later, scholars were sure there were only six when Gene Roddenberry creator of Star Trek, planets. Here’s how we got the new appropriated the planet and made it home of ones. Spock. THE END OF THE SOLAR THE END OF THE SOLAR SYSTEM SYSTEM People have always known about Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn. Early civilizations names the days of the week after Neptune each of these planets, plus the sun and the moon. The Greeks watched them move through NEPTUNE NEPTUNE the night sky, passing in front of the stars that make up the constellations of the zodiac, and The newly found planet had a slight called them planets - which means “wanderers.” variation in its orbit, almost as if something As recently as the 1700s. people still were tugging at it. Could there be another planet believed that the planet Saturn was the farthest affecting Uranus? A century earlier, Isaac extent of the solar system. That there might be Newton had come up with laws describing the other planets wasn’t even a respectable idea. effect that the gravitational forces of planets But as technology and science became more have on one another. Using Newton's laws, two sophisticated, other members of the solar young scientists set out independently in 1840 to find the unknown planet whose gravitational forces might be pulling on Uranus.One of the Plutio scientists was a French mathematician, Jean Leverrier. The other was an English astronomer, PLUTO John Couch Adams. Both hoped the unknown PLUTO planet would be where their calculations said The discovery of Neptune did not they could find it. completely account for the peculiar movement of Uranus. Once again, scientists considered the THE HIDDEN PLANET pull of another planet as a cause and set out to THE HIDDEN PLANET Adams finished his calculations first, in find “Planet X.” Using the telescope at his September 1845. The following August, observatory in Flagstaff, Arizona, Percival Leverrier completed his. Neither had access to a Lowell searched for Planet X for 10 years. After large telescope, so they couldn’t verify their he died in 1916, his brother gave the projections - and no one would make one observatory a donation that enabled it to buy a available to them. Finally, Leverrier traveled on telescope-camera. The light-sensitive process of to the Berlin Observatory in Germany, and the photography allowed astronomers to capture young assistant manager, Johann Gottfried images of dim and distant stars that they Uranus Galle, agreed to help search for the planet. couldn’t see, even with the aid of a telescope. In 1929 the Lowell Observatory hired system were discovered. That was September 23, 1846, That Clyde Tombaugh, a young self-taught night Galle looked through the telescope, astronomer from Kansas, to continue the search URANUS calling out stars and their positions while a for Planet X. Lowell had suggested that the URANUS In 1781 a self taught astronomer, young student astronomer, Heinrich Louis unknown planet was in the Gemini region of William Herschel, was “sweeping the skies” d’Arrest, looked at a star chart searching for the the sky. Using an instrument called the blink with his telescope. By March he had reached the stars Galle described. Finally, Galled called out microscope, Tombaugh took two photographs section that included the constellation an eighth-magnitude star that d’Arrest couldn’t of that area of the sky a few days apart and Gemini,and he spotted an object that appeared locate on the charts. They found the unknown placed them side by side under a microscope. If as a disk rather than a glowing star. Because it planet! It had taken two years of research - but something moved in the sky, as planets do, it moved slightly from week to week, Herschel only a half hour at the telescope. The honor of would appear as a speck of light jumping back thought ti was circular... and came to the the discovery belongs to both Adams and and forth as Tombaugh’s eyes moved from one shocking conclusion that it wasn’t a comet, but Leverrier, who had essentially discovered the photograph to the other, looking through the an unknown planet. People were astonished. new planet with just a pen and new set of microscope. mathematical laws. The greenish planet was named after Neptune, god of the sea. That’s just what happened. The FINDING NAME observatory announced the discovery of th ninth FINDING A A NAME No one since ancient times had names a VULCAN planet on March 13, 1930. An 11-year-old girl, VULCAN planet. Herschel felt that it should be called daughter of an Oxford astronomy professor, “Georgium Sidus” (George’s Star) in honor of Leverrier was on a roll. He started chose the name Pluto - the god of the his patron George III - the king of England who looking for other planets... and became netherworld - for the new planet. reigned during the American Revolution. Some convinced that there was one between the sun For years before his death, Tombaugh people wanted to name it “Herschel” after its and Mercury, He called his planet “Vulcan,” the repeatedly declared that there were no more discoverer. But one influential astronomer god of fire, because it was so close to the sun. planets in out solar system. If there were, he suggested they call it “Uranus,” after the Greek Leverrier noted that, like Uranus, Mercury said, he would have found them. [] god of the heavens. That made sense, since the experiences disturbances that caused it to travel ACTOID: new planet was certainly the limit of the skies of farther in one point in its orbit. Since Neptune F FACTOID: British anatomist Richard Owen the solar system. Or so they thought. was one of the causes of similar pulls on invented the word dinosaur in 1841. Uranus, it made sense that another planet was