Hot Jupiters

TVF, The Earth is moving through the solar wind at much slower speed than the wind speed. How does any change occur within the shadow that would effect the composition of the wind? If molecules are observed in the shadow then the wind must be molecules too. I've been wondering how much mass from the solar wind the Earth displaces and how much energy is by Earth lost to that displacment of solar wind mass. Any idea?

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by Jim</i>
<br />If molecules are observed in the shadow then the wind must be molecules too.<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">No, the detection of hydrogen means it must come from Earth because we do not see that much hydrogen (if any) in the solar wind. From Earth, hydrogen is no surprise because of the photodisassociation of atmospheric H2O molecules into orygen (which mostly does not escape) and hydrogen (which eventually does).

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">I've been wondering how much mass from the solar wind the Earth displaces and how much energy is by Earth lost to that displacment of solar wind mass. Any idea?<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">It is negligible for dynamical purposes, which is all I was interested in. But solar radiation pressure (from sunlight) is roughly 100 times stronger than solar wind force, and is the main reason why balloon satellites get pushed around so much. -|Tom|-

Are the parent stars of these "hot Jupiters" then observed to actually be T-Tauri stars?

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by nemesis</i>
<br />Are the parent stars of these "hot Jupiters" then observed to actually be T-Tauri stars?<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">No, but the T-Tauri stage is very short-lived on a stellar evolution timescale.

But when we have better data on these hot Jupiters and their parent stars, it will be interesting to see if the estimated star age and the estimated outward tidal evolution timescale for the planets are compatible. One prediction: If the hot Jupiters and other matter were still migrating inward (standard model), the parent star's spin should be increasing because of accretion. If there had been a "recent" fission, the parent star's rotation speed should have slowed greatly. We should be able to apply such a test now, at least statistically if not for individual cases. -|Tom|-

TVF, You say the solar wind is not particles of hydrogen or very little of it is hydrogen-so what is the composition of the solar wind and how is solar radiation pressure any different than the solar constant or is it the same thing with a different title?

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by Jim</i>
<br />You say the solar wind is not particles of hydrogen or very little of it is hydrogen-so what is the composition of the solar wind and how is solar radiation pressure any different than the solar constant or is it the same thing with a different title?<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">For the solar wind composition, try a web search. For example, the Wiki on that can be found at en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_wind

Solar radiation pressure is the pressure of sunlight, which involves only lightwaves, but no particles with mass.

As I mentioned, solar radiation pressure is ~100 times stronger than solar wind at Earth's orbit. -|Tom|-