Extra-Solar Planets

The word planet means "wanderer" in Greek. It derives from the fact that planets within our solar system seem generally to wander eastward about the so-called fixed stars across the zodiac constellations (Kolb). There is no clear consensus precisely defining what constitutes a planet, as distinguished from brown dwarfs, which are the material remnants of burned out ancient stars whose masses where too small to form white dwarfs or collapse completely, forming black holes in the manner that stars much larger than ten solar masses, or ten times the mass of our sun

Hawking).

Generally, planets are defined as a body that emits no light or other energy of its own, but orbits a star, reflecting its light. A more technical definition of a planet relies on its size relative to the mass of Jupiter or "Mjup's." According to this description, a planet is larger than Pluto and...
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