First Evidence of a Giant Exoplanet Collision

D-brief
By Jake Parks
Feb 18, 2019 9:45 PMMay 21, 2019 6:02 PM
A planetary collision is exactly as bad as you would imagine
A planetary collision is exactly as bad as you would imagine. Unlike an asteroid impact, there's not just a crater left behind. Instead, such a massive crash causes the surviving world to be stripped of much of its lighter elements, leaving behind an overly dense core. (Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech)

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For the first time ever, astronomers think they’ve discovered an exoplanet that survived a catastrophic collision with another planet. And according to the new research, which was published Feb. 4, in the journal Nature Astronomy, the evidence for the impact comes from two twin exoplanets that seem to be more fraternal than identical.

Mass Matters

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