What Are Eyeball Planets And How Are They Formed ?

What Are Eyeball Planets And How Are They Formed ?

Eyeball planets are formed when strange and exotic exoplanets are hunted

down. The search for habitable zones around other stars keeps going,

and as long as conditions are just right, bacteria-sized organisms could

flourish. These planets are often called 'eyeball' planets because

they resemble our own home planet from afar

the hunt for interesting exoplanets and

life forms somewhere out there in the

vast expanse of the universe keeps going

no stopping here we're basically

searching for a second Earth a planet

that's similar to our home and where we

could finally find some space friends

hey we're not picky any form of life is

fine even some bacteria-sized organisms

and this search has mostly been going on

in the habitable zone around other stars

we call this the Goldilocks zone that's

a region where conditions are barely

just right for liquid water to exist

whether we're talking about the surface

of a planet or a moon?

the hotter the star the more space we

get to explore because its habitable

zone spreads far away and in terms of

endless space that we yet know so little

about that's a lot of work that's why

we're fans of red dwarfs there are

hundreds of billions of stars in our

galaxy and probably around 80 percent of

them are red dwarfs these tiny stars are

much cooler than our sun it means that

their habitable zones are much smaller

and closer to the star so we know better

where to look for planets they're

circling around their Central Star and

at some point Bingo there it is they

pass in front of it and block out some

of its light

the Kepler space telescope has already

helped us find thousands of planets

using this method and most of them are

orbiting around red dwarfs some of these

planets are similar in size to Earth and

many of them could have nearly 25 times

more water than our entire planet

let's move to these planets scientists

discovered though I want to show you

something special so you've heard of

super Earth's right more massive than

Earth lighter than Neptune can be made

of rock gas or a mix of both some of

them have thick atmospheres While others

have thin or no atmospheres at all you

may also have stumbled upon many

Neptunes by now too they're almost as

big as Neptune and unlike normal gas

giants they have solid cores that way

they can support a dense atmosphere with

water and some other chemicals necessary

for life

there's also hot Jupiters those are

pretty cool but only if they're far away

from us you know that one annoying and

unpredictable neighbor you can never get

rid of or figure out what they're going

to do yeah that would be a hot Jupiter

with strong gravity that can destabilize

the orbits of smaller planets or other

space bodies in the system if we had

such a neighbor there would be more

comets and asteroids hitting our surface

luckily our Jupiters a good and peaceful

neighbor that Minds his own business at

least for now

but let's leave all these and many other

planets out there alone now imagine

traveling around in your spaceship and

coming across a giant eyeball just

floating there in the darkness of space

and staring at the central star of that

solar system it's not a monster

hopefully space friends will make in the

future won't look that big and scary so

it won't blink or turn towards you as

you come closer it's actually a planet a

little bit bizarre but still very cool

and yup you guessed it right we call

such eyeball planets now eyeball planets

are surprisingly common plus some normal

planets can potentially turn into them

too

eyeball planets form when matter and

dust accumulates around a star and

gradually turns into a solid object it

starts spinning and over time the

gravity of the star pulls on the planet

and slows its rotation until it becomes

tidally locked that means one hemisphere

always faces the star while the other is

in darkness all the time

now we have a good example of this

phenomenon near us too our moon makes a

circle around earth once a month it

takes the same amount of time to turn a

single time on its axis that way we

actually always see the same face of the

Moon who knows maybe the other side is

even prettier if you know you like

craters and stuff

so one of the most interesting things

about eyeball planets is their

appearance if they had water on their

surface the side facing the star would

have clear bright blue oceans the ones

we'd want to visit if we ever got a

chance to go on an Interstellar vacation

and the other side would be more for

adventurers who like harsh and

challenging surroundings since it's in

constant Darkness it would most likely

be very cold and covered in ice

you know we've discovered so many

planets outside of our solar system in

the last 30 years

super Earths are of course especially

interesting it seems that many of them

are not that Pleasant since they're

pretty hazy and cloudy it means it's

harder to spot any life there but some

scientists still think they're promising

spots when it comes to finding life

beyond our solar system

eyeball super earths would be a good

start these planets are probably covered

in large oceans on the cold half where

the Eternal Night rains you'd experience

Arctic conditions I feel cold just

looking at this but the day side Is My

Jam Plus it sounds promising when it

comes to finding life you know with all

that sunlight oceans and stuff

one of the good examples where

scientists are looking for life is an

eyeball super Earth that lies in a

habitable zone of the closest star to

our solar system called Proxima B its

Desai could even have conditions and an

atmosphere to support some form of life

there could be a large deep ocean

covering its surface it could be really

salty but some forms of life could still

survive there check out the Dead Sea on

Earth it's extremely salty but some

bacteria have still evolved to live

there and they're probably doing well

having their own world and all that I

mean it's not crowded because there are

no animals there fish that accidentally

end up in the Dead Sea won't survive

there for long so similarly it's

possible that bacteria or some other

forms of life could exist in this

potentially very salty ocean on Proxima

b as well

but the open ocean on Proxima B could be

tricky on the dark side of the planet

the ocean could freeze and sea ice could

drift into warmer Waters that way the

ocean would cool and more and more of it

would freeze even On the Sunny Side the

only way to prevent This Global freeze

over would be an atmosphere with a lot

of greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide

this kind of atmosphere would trap the

heat from the planet's surface and

wouldn't allow it to escape into space

like what happens with Venus the hottest

planet in our solar system without an

atmosphere with greenhouse gases the

surface of Proxima B would be much

colder so it's possible that the planet

would completely freeze over

the opposite scenario could also be

possible warmer Waters could serve as a

transporter of heat from warm to cold

regions we don't know much about the

conditions on the planet yet so Proxima

B could range from a frozen Wasteland to

a hot hazy World depending on many

factors so yeah an eyeball Planet within

the habitable zone sounds promising but

its surface can still wildly range from

a frozen desert to an endless ocean

some experts believe that drifting sea

ice my cool mini exoplanets out there

and they can't turn into eyeball worlds

instead many just become sad dark

snowballs completely covered in ice a

cool spot to spend your Interstellar

Winter holidays but not a place where

you'd hope to find life unfortunately

some studies show that even Earth may

have gone through some snowball stages

many times in history one of those

happened around 2.2 billion years ago I

wasn't around while the other one hit

the planet 630 million years ago during

these phases all of our beautiful oceans

were covered with snow and sea odds

perhaps even the continents were just

thick ice sheets at least on the surface

all right enough with the Freezy icy

stuff I need some hot chocolate

that's it for today so hey if you

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