The 500th exoplanet discovered
Astronomers have discovered 508 planets including the eight in our solar system, but we aren’t really sure which is the 500th, due to there being occasional false positive’s in the data. What process do you think was used to discover these planets? Also, an astrophysicist is debunking the big bang theory as the origin of our universe. Roger Penrose theorizes that by looking at characteristics back through or big bang to “earlier eons of our universe” that we have cycles of regeneration over and over again. This points to the fact that the information we have about the early universe is very slim and we need additional evidence to come up with other scenarios.[audio: st20101129.mp3]
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Skytalk is hosted by WHYY's Dave Heller. Each week he discusses the latest news in astronomy with Dr. Derrick H. Pitts of the Franklin Institute.
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