If i may interject;
You may find life beyond the Goldilocks zone, if you consider liquid methane to be a solvent (water is our solvent). This is even there in ME Lore, thanks to the Volus.
Beyond that fact you may even find very varying planets. a few things to consider:
Solid or melted core: this translates into a more massive planet or less massive, moreover, this is also directly linked to how powerful the magnetosphere is. And has an impact on whether the sun blows the atmosphere away or doesn't. Hell, it even establishes if there is an active plate tectonic system in place, which is very important.
heck if you'd like to read a long read be my guest:
Objects smaller than planetoids/dwarf planets.
These objects are by far the most common found in any solar system, but at the same time they are probably the ones with the least mass, in comparison with the other possible objects which could be found on solar systems. First off we can find space dust, this is nothing else than dust which floats around its parent start, it is the most susceptible of the bodies to solar wind.
Following dust we can find meteoroids, this is composed of any type of specs bigger than dust, and smaller than asteroids. Asteroids are catalogued when bigger than 15 centimeters (in reality asteroids are only those rocks stationed between Mars and Jupiter). And up to 300 miles in diameter (when they are forced to get shaped more planet like). They also come in groups, if you find just one rock in an orbit with 300 or more in size it would probably be a planet. Planetoids, are rocks big enough (300 miles or more in diameter) that are in orbit with the parent star BUT, share the orbit with other objects, making up for the bulk of the mass found in that orbit.
To achieve the status of planet. The candidate must be 300 miles at least in diameter and also have hydrostatic equilibrium. Moreover, they need to have their own orbit.
Finally comets are rocks or debris from varying size. With a stable eccentric orbit around the parent star. They are usually composed of frozen water, and rocks. When nearing the sun the frozen ice melts generating a tail.
Planets:
Dwarf Planets are those that have enough mass, but have a shared orbit with other objects, this means that other stuff is hurling in their same orbit, and that the orbit is not cleaned.
Planets themselves acquire more characteristics to those found on lesser objects. First of they have enough mass to generate their own orbit, clean of other debris, but at the same time, they could harbor moons orbiting around them.
Moons are satellites, they can vary in size, but share the fact that instead of orbiting the parent star, they orbit another celestial body orbiting said star. Moreover Moons are smaller than the host planet.
Planet classification:
There are various types of planets:
- Rocky Planets
o Chthonian Planet: the remaining rocky core of a used to be Gas Giant. The atmosphere was all blown away by some force of extreme magnitude, such as solar erosion, or some other kind of force. This left the bare core usually rich in heavy metals, and very dense.
o Carbon planets: planets that are mostly formed of carbon. This is due to when they formed there where larger amounts of carbon than oxygen. This translates into planets with possible metallic nucleus, and probably over it silicon carbide and titanium carbide in liquid state. The cortex might be composed of graphite, and if enough pressure was present, large amount of diamonds. Plaque tectonics is possible. The lack of oxygen implies the lack of water, therefore liquids might be hydrocarbon based like tar and methane.
o Iron Planets: rocky planets in which thanks to various hazards their mantle was displaced revealing the core exposed. They usually come with a ring, and/or several moons.
o Terrestrial Planets: those planets with a metallic core, oxygen and silicon concentration.
§ Planet Metallic Cores: Planets may come in two types, with a metallic core and without. Planets with a metallic core will probably have stronger magnetic fields, and also plaque tectonics (as long as the core is active and melted). When no core is present planets will tend to be more passive and without many of the sides effects of metallic cores (such as volcanic eruptions, and earthquakes) but at the same time they will be a lot poorer regarding metallic availability.
§ Without Metallic Cores: less massive planets with way weaker magnetosphere will tend to be a lot less hospitable, but that does not mean they can’t sustain life. If the star is small enough and mature enough not to be spewing solar wind everywhere there should be enough power on the magnetosphere to sustain life, and keep an atmosphere.
- Gas Planets
o Gas Giants: those planets which mass is ten times that of the earth, and instead of having an atmosphere small in comparison with the rocky parts, the majority of the planet is based of gasses. The limit for gas giants is when they begin to produced deuterium, once they reach this point they are called brown dwarfs (the previous step to becoming stars) the size of these planets is 13 times that of Jupiter. These planets are composed by Hydrogen and Helium. If sufficiently cold, their nucleus could be permanently molten, if not it would disperse into the super-heated gas.
o Helium Planet: they are also known as white dwarfs, mostly found on binary star systems, in which the more massive star steals the hydrogen from her partner leaving only the helium.
o Ice Giants: Planets with much less mass than Gas Giants, and with a different composition. Their Hydrogen count is smaller and it is replaced by other compounds such as methane and water. This other compounds are usually found as supercritical fluids.
Planet Orbits
- Circumbinary Planet: planet which orbits around two stars.
- Double Planet: When two planets of the same mas orbit between them around a parent star.
- Eccentric Giant: Gas giants that have orbits similar to those of comets, instead of having a rounder orbit they have long elliptical ones. This tends to shot away from inner orbits rocky planets, rendering them useless for habitation (they are usually displaced from the goldilocks zone)
- Hot Giant: typical Gas giant which are caught very near their parent star, this tends to heat the atmosphere of said planet, expanding them and swelling them.
- Interstellar Planet: those planets that lack a parent star, they just float around between solar systems.
Stars:
Stars are classified in regards of their spectra (it means the elements they absorb) and their temperature. In regards of the spectra, it is based on breaking down the light coming from a star with a prism and noticing the amount of ionized materials. In the case of temperature, there are 7 general types of temperature variations: these are: O, B, A, F, G, K and M.
We will use the MK, or Yerkes chart within the Universe to catalogue the different stars.
Type
Star
Ia
Very luminous supergiants
Ib
Less luminous supergiants
II
Luminous Giants
III
Giants
IV
Subgiants
V
Main sequence stars
VI
Subdwarf
VII
White Dwarf
This chart adds another layer of information regarding stars, because stars not only depend of temperature, but also of the light and radiation they emit. This makes for qualifying stars much easier.
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