Open AccessWant to find planets? Track the lithium
Publication year - 2009
Publication title -
astronomy & geophysics
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.168
H-Index - 22
eISSN - 1468-4004
pISSN - 1366-8781
DOI - 10.1111/j.1468-4004.2009.50604_2.x
Subject(s) - planet , track (disk drive) , astrobiology , lithium (medication) , geology , astronomy , physics , engineering , psychology , mechanical engineering , psychiatry
A spectrographic survey has found that stars with planets – like our Sun – tend to have a lot less lithium in their make‐up than comparable stars without planetary systems. It is not yet clear how this comes about, but it points the way to a shortcut to finding new exoplanetary systems.