Is Earth unique, and are there so many such planets in space? Astronomers have long been troubled by this question. They are surprised too Or gas giants like Jupiter and Saturn favor the formation of lifeOr vice versa.

Scientists from XXX performed computer simulations of the motion of 140,000 planetary systems, including two gas giants. The results surprised them a little.

In many such systems (60% of simulations), no planet had a permanent orbit to the “Goldilocks Zone”. This is what astronomers call a narrow region around a star, where water is more likely to remain in liquid form. Too cold A very hot planet ends up without water, and very cold.

Of those approximately 150,000 systems, only eight have Earth-sized fixed orbits at right distances from the Sun-type star. That is to say, it is However, the land will be very special.

However, in these 253 simulated systems, the presence of gas giants allowed the planet to form at precise distances from the star, and The orbit of such “earth” was stabilized. They are a small percentage of deals, but they are extraordinarily favorable to the possible life.

Two gas giants with a mass of one tenth of Jupiter are the most “successful” systems orbiting the star, Nora Bailey, one of the authors of the calculations, told New Scientist at the University of Chicago.

He adds that the presence of two giants in this system certainly does not guarantee the existence of an Earth-like planet (let life in it). However, in doing so, it greatly increases the likelihood that its orbit will be stable for billions of years.

This is a hint We can guide the lenses of telescopes in search of signs of life, And where it is not worth it. Many of the planets’ orbits are unstable from the point of view of millions of years – life ends when they fall into a star or are thrown like a sling stone from their mother system.

That may be a relief From this point of view the solar system is stable. Long-term calculations (for example, hundreds of millions of years) already result in a lot of errors.