Free Astronomy Magazine May-June 2016

The originality of nature in creating planetary sys- tems far exceeds the researchers’ imagination in predicting their characteristics through mathe- matical models. The variety of new worlds that are being discovered appears end- less, so much so that many of the more recently studied planets should not even exist... but only in theory! by Michele Ferrara PLANETOLOGY MAY-JUNE 2016 A rtist’s con- ception of planet 55 Cancri e, transiting on the disk of its host star. This blazing-hot world is the first super- Earth whose at- mosphere has been analyzed. [ESA/Hubble, M. Kornmesser] Stranger an unpredictab worlds