Astronomers Uncover Real-Existence Tatooine

This just in from space: The lately-discovered planet Kepler 16b already features a movie-friendly nickname because of the astronomers who think it is: Tatooine. Like it's the first planet that earthbound stargazers have ever found which orbits two suns -- similar to Luke Skywalker's home world in 'Star Wars.' "Reality has finally taken track of sci-fi,Inch mentioned Alan P. Boss in the Carnegie Institution, an connect in the research team that found the completely new planet, inside a press conference yesterday, in line with the NY Occasions. Much is made of the hyperlink between reality and sci-fi throughout Thursday's announcement at NASA's Ames Research Laboratory in Mountain View, California. Really, John Knoll, an obvious effects supervisor at Lucasfilm's Industrial Light & Miracle who done several 'Star Wars' movies, was available in case and shown a clip from 'Star Wars: Episode IV - A Completely New Hope' that signifies Tatooine's famous binary sunset. 'Star Wars: Episode IV - A Completely New Hope': The Binary Sunset on Tatooine In line with the astronomers -- who made the invention via NASA's Kepler spacecraft -- Tatooine is most likely a ball of gas and rock that's about how exactly large Saturn. It's 200 light-years away, inside the Cygnus constellation. The Two suns will be different dimensions, and are both a lot more compact than our sun. Tatooine is about as definately not the center of its pv system as Venus originates from our sun. Our planet orbits the pair of suns once every 229 days. The Two suns spin around each other every 41 days. The invention of Tatooine is forcing astronomers to re-think their ideas of techniques planets form and obtain stable orbits, since Kepler 16b is two occasions as close to its two suns as earlier models had predicted. Scientists have found huge levels of binary star systems, while not to date they've confirmed the existence of a planet turning about the subject. Weather-wise, Kepler 16b is closer to frigid Hoth (of 'Star Wars: Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back') than for the sweltering desert arena of Tatooine as described with the 'Star Wars' saga. The shifting suns cause rapid and dramatic versions in temperature, that could vary from minus 100 to minus 150 levels Fahrenheit within days. Lucasfilm's Kroll made an appearance not disappointed with this discrepancy. "Again and again we view the science is stranger and weirder than fiction," he mentioned. "The data about this discovery provides provocke dream bigger." [NY Occasions via EW/PopWatch] Follow Gary Susman on Twitter @garysusman. Photo Credit: AFP/Getty Images