What counts as a moon? Huge ‘exosatellite’ sparks debate
Nature Podcast

What counts as a moon? Huge ‘exosatellite’ sparks debate

B2Upper-intermediateJuly 22, 202623 min

00:45 The discovery of a moon-like object in a distant star system Research article: Hoy et al. 10:34 Research Highlights Nature: Moving floors keep buildings from swaying with the wind Nature: Wearable sensors on the face are invisible to the eye 13:07 A discovery of a new type of rare transmissible-cancer Research article: Curd et al. Subscribe to Nature Briefing, an unmissable daily round-up of science news, opinion and analysis free in your inbox every weekday. Hosted on Acast...

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Now, moons are generally considered to be natural satellites orbiting something,

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In this case, our moon-adjacent object is orbiting something else, a brown dwarf,

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0:00

Welcome back to the Nature Podcast. This time, the exomoon that isn't. And a transmissible cancer in catfish. I'm Benjamin Thompson.

0:34

And I'm Nick Petrich Howell. In Star Wars Episode 4, In You Hope, Obi-Wan Kenobi mutters the immortal words, that's no moon. And that may be the cry of millions of astronomers in response to a new nature paper

1:00

that details something that looks a lot like a moon and sounds a bit like a moon, but kind of isn't. Now, moons are generally considered to be natural satellites orbiting something, usually a planet or a dwarf planet, which is itself orbiting a star. In this case, our moon-adjacent object is orbiting something else, a brown dwarf,

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