Posts tagged astronomy
There is an earth like planet, with similar mass, gravity, atmosphere and magnetic field. The main difference with earth is that it has a highly eccentric orbit (eccentricity 0.8). Let's say that ...
Assume there are three earth-like worlds in our solar system. These three worlds would also have a single natural satellite roughly at the same mass-distance ratio of Earth to the Moon (about 1.2 p...
I am trying to design a world where one pole is very cold, and the other is very hot. I don't mean that there would be instant death in either, but it is colder than our South Pole on one end and w...
This seemed too scifi or hypothetical for physics, so here goes. Suppose a manipulated quark with 0 mass could travel faster than the speed of light. It's known that the faster you go, the slower...
So let's say it's a big planet, like a Jupiter. Not talking about our Solar System. This is hypothetical. But say a Jupiter-esque planet in a solar system suddenly disappears. And by disappears I m...
I understand this is a broad topic that to a degree was answered in previous questions. What I'm trying to do is to create a plugin in Unreal 4. I'll start by creating a day/night system and a sk...
An experienced space time traveler teleports from place to place and planet to planet with a vehicle or using psychic powers. Now suppose that this traveler teleports to a habitable planet. Suppos...
One of my more brilliant characters is taking a terraforming class and at one point, early in the story, she has to leave the action to take an exam. The question presented in that scene is listed...
Part 1 On Earth, we have seasons due to our planet's tilt. In my last question, I proposed an alternative world where the seasons were instead caused by an eccentric orbit. Now I'm going for somet...
This question is inspired by NASA's recent TRAPPIST-1 announcement. Imagine two planets orbiting a star with orbits very close together. At the nearest point in their respective orbits they are onl...
I'm building an alien world for a game mod, and want to avoid any blatant mistakes from a world-building perspective. The world has three moons visible in the night sky - two on one side near each ...
I have a planet with two moons. I want them on opposite sides during the equinoxes and together during the solstices. The seasons are a little lopsided, with spring and autumn having 90 days and th...
It doesn't have to be a rock, in fact it would probably be depleted uranium or even some crazy material like neutronium.
The world will going to be the homeworld of an hairless feline humanoid race, but I want to see the plausibility of this scenario?
Worldbuilder in dire need! I'm trying to figure out the eclipse length of a habitable Earth-like moon that is rotating around a gas giant. The story that I work on is centered on the Earth-like mo...
Supposing you are trying to colonise planet that has no life what-so-ever but is otherwise an earth analogue. First thing that I realised is that there would be no oil. So they would need to make ...
The way the Earth travels is dependent on the gravitational influence of matter that surrounds it. This question is of how/if we can prevent or reduce certain objects effects on Earths movements th...
In real life constellations are stars, picked out amongst a myriad of stars. But in a fictional world, I don't have a field of stars to begin with and I'm not sure it would be worth creating one fo...
I'm trying to imagine mystery setting when amateur astronomer stumbles upon a torrent which contains a 3D map of the Milky Way galaxy. The map contains all large objects: star systems, planets, ne...
I'm contemplating a world in which there is some sort of cyclical darkness that covers a continent or the whole planet, and humanity has to adjust to deal with the creatures that surface when the d...
This question is about a phenomenon in the Dark Forest, part of the Three Body Problem science-fiction trilogy often considered 'hard science'. Be warned: there are major spoilers below for those w...
Take the Earth-Moon system as we know it. Now, something causes a large rock to be lobbed in the direction of our moon. Exactly how that happens is deliberately left unspecified; it could be everyt...
What would the orbit of a planet orbiting two stars look like? Would the planet orbit the stars simultaneously or one after the other? How strong might be the gravity well of such a system be? Any ...
In some star clusters, the stars are packed as densely as a light year apart or less. Many clusters do not appear to have black holes in the center, though they remain relatively stable in their or...
Would a blind astronaut be able to sense the gravity of a nearby star/planet/moon? Would an astronaut lost somewhere inside the Sun be able to sense which way is the core and which way is the surf...
I want to build a planet (or satellite) that: is smaller than Earth, has a thicker atmosphere than Earth but breathable, has neither intense volcanism, nor any extreme condition of that sort that...
How can I make it so that an otherwise colonizable planet (or moon) can (entirely naturally) seem uninhabitable from a certain point on its surface? Background: There are a series of immovable gat...
I want to play with the idea of a sapient species evolving on a world where at least part of the world experiences a permanent day. The obvious way to doing this would be where part of the world f...
Preamble The Alternity Cosmos II is a complement to a dice role-playing game that uses heuristics based on hard-science to 'build' plausible star systems for the Alternity game: http://www.altern...
I have a mars-sized "planet" orbiting a superearth-sized mother-planet. There is also another satellite with an abnormal elliptic orbit, but it is of minor concern for now. This is the resume of ...
Suppose that I have a spherical space-ship with an approximately 1 kilometer diameter. For some reason I need to park it (unmanned) for a long period (100+ years) fairly close to the Sun. (Half the...
Given advanced enough telescopic technology, would it be possible to detect that a planet in the order of 50 light years away is inhabitable? (i.e. without having to actually go there) I'm just lo...
I'd like to have an advanced civilization that lives in a ring around their sun, but a ring planet just can't work. In this case, they are among densely agglomerated asteroids (with life support, ...
So, I'm writing a set of short stories (i.e. in the "Martian Chronicles" format). It was going to be centered around life on Earth through the sudden dissapearance of the Sun, but after surprinsing...
I Was playing space engine and i was looking for a planet like Earth for quite some time and then i stumbled on this beautiful world covered with liquid water which orbited a main sequence star wit...
Self-explanatory. I have a planet-eating entity moving slowly across the solar system towards Earth and I wanna know how long it would take for us to notice its presence once it starts consuming Pl...
I'm wondering what natural phenomenon would allow a planet to have a part of its surface always under daylight, a part of its surface never seeing said light, and a third part where day and night c...
Assume the planet's orbit around Sirius B is much closer to its parent star than we are to the sun so it still receives enough light and heat to form an Earth-like environment. What does night look...
I'm wondering if it is possible for a planet to have one pole always facing its star, the other always facing away (by rotating as if a tidal-locked planet), but style have a day and night cycle on...
Proxima Centauri may have a rocky, earth like planet close to its dim sun. Tidally locked, the sun facing side may have a temperature up to 30 degrees Celsius and a dark side of -30 C. This would m...
As the title says, what if a neutron star stops spinning what will happen to the materials that the neutron star is made of? Will they still be super dense? Are they brittle? If they are, how st...
Inspired by Mapping the far side of the galaxy, I wondered how it would be possible to create a real-time map of the entire universe. As that question dealt with the issue of a one-time travel to ...
Humans got a one time ticket to the other side of the galaxy, traveling $2r$ in just a few days (where $r$ is the distance from earth to the super massive black hole: 28,000 lightyears) The stars ...
I was thinking of a set of life forms that originates from neutron superfluid inside a neutron star. So these life forms are not made of atoms but are made entirely of neutrons. How might this li...
I need to know what would be the orbital period (so, how long would last a year/day) of an Earth-like planet tidally-locked to a red dwarf. The star is at the upper limit of the red dwarfs (so, ar...
After reevaluating my sense of perspective on sublight interstellar travel, I'm thinking of moving my planet closer to Earth to cut down on travel time and fuel costs. However, the planet my coloni...
I always feel like "hypothetical history of science" questions are kind of impossible, but here's a go anyway: Imagine that, for the entirety of human history, EM radiation from anything beyond th...
Assuming we had a gas giant instead of Mars in our planetary system. Everything else stays the same. Which long-term and short-term consequences for life on Earth would I have to take into account?
I read What would make scientists realize they were on a flat world?, and I decided to make a similar one. Scenario: While poking around in an alien ruin, scientists discover a gateway which of...
Let's say that a "terraformable planet" is a planet who : is in the goldilock zone of its star(s) has around the same gravity as Earth has a solid surface covered with minerals not too toxic for...
