is it possible for a planet to orbit binary stars? i.e. tatooine in star wars?
599607
maybe in a figuire 8? i think ig the conditions are just right  why not?
470943
in the GALAXY-9,in the WORLD...NONE (how can a planet fit inside anoter planet?)
492238
Polaris may not be due north on a planet with a different tilt to its axis, but you would use whatever was due north as a pole star instead
752567
Most probably, none, for brown dwarf stars are sub-stellar objects with a mass below that necessary to maintain hydrogen-burning nuclear fusion reactions in their core.  Without hydrogen one of the primary building blocks for the inception of life, an Earth like planet, or even a remotely similar planet, having polybiological opportunities for the generation of life could not be formed.  The only planet known to orbit a brown dwarf star is 2M1207b.  Furthermore, there is speculation that even the presence of hydrogen is not enough to create the conditions ripe for the emergence of life, for quantum equations completed 6 years ago reveal that our G-2 class star is far too small to have created the heavier rare elements in the human body and on Earth.  These elements can only be generated by a Blue Supergiant.  Hence, our Sun is not our paternal star, and Earth-like planets are the by-product of Blue Supergiants, not G-2 class stars.
1029405
You've almost answered your own question:  Stars are "stationary" sources of energy (nuclear) and give off light.  Planets do not and they orbit stars.
1052164
Ask those living in other planets!
549175
Planets would only describe circular orbits if they were moving with the correct speed for their distance from the sun. Any slight disturbance to their motion, such as asteroid impact, would cause their motion to become elliptical. For instance if they lost energy (and speed) as a result of a collision they would be pulled closer to the sun as the result of its gravity. This would cause them to speed up and start moving away from the sun until their speed decreased so much that they were pulled towards the sun again. This is the elliptical motion of planets.\nUnless the solar system were intelligently designed it would be impossible (probability = 0) for any planet to be moving in a /perfect/ circle.
364063
Chances are, yes.\n\n90% of all solar systems are not in a circle so they can not support life.  Of the 10% that are left what are the odds that another planet is moving around a sun where it's not to hot or too cold. Even in our own little solar system there is only one.\n\nSo, if there is life elsewhere, we will never meet them.
615320
No way, there must be many, many planets throughout the universe that are similar to our own and support life. There are probably many others that support life that is much different than we are accustomed to also.
1130994
Yes, the planets go through phases. Celestial phases are basically light hitting different hemispheres at different times.
123160
Yes!\n\nOur galaxy is rotating, in the sense that all the stars are in orbits around a common center, which happens to have a big black hole. Because the distribution of mass in something like a galaxy is different from a solar system, these orbits are not simple ellipses.\n\nIt takes the sun (and the rest of the solar system) about 250 million years to make it all the way around.\n\nOur Galaxy is also interacting with other galaxies, in particular with the Andromeda Galaxy which is, relatively speaking, close by.\n\nIn fact, our Galaxy and Andromeda are headed for a collision in about, oh, a few billion years. However the distance between stars in a galaxy is such that there will be fewm if any, star-star collisons.
1012916
Yes, absolutely.  An eclipse occurs whenever one astronomical body passes over another.  If that shadow is not big enough to completely block the body (planet, moon, sun), the eclipse is called a 'transit'.  But there are plenty of opportunities for all kinds of eclipses.\n\nFor example, occasionally a planet visible from the earth passes in front of a star - that's called an eclipse.  Jupiter may eclipse Rigel, for example.  Those same kind of eclipses would occur anywhere in the solar system, not just here on earth. \n\nFor example, someday human explorers on Mars may see earth transit across the face of the sun, then eclipse a star in Libra.  \n\nAnd this would hold true for extrasolar areas (e.g. planets around distant suns) as well.  They could definitely see all kinds of eclipses there, too.
156280
no...stars are not planets, they are comprised primarily of extemely high and volatile gases that burn without oxygen.
683582
There are about a couple hundred billion stars in our galaxy. The stars close to the center are not likely to have planets because of dynamical considerations (other stars pass by too frequently to have stable orbits).\n\nThe BIG question is how many planets there are per star on average. Our sun has ten planets and assorted other objects. We have found many other planets orbiting other stars, but most of those stars have only one planet (that we have detected). One has three planets that we know about. HOWEVER, the way we detect these planets favors detecting large planets that are very close to their star. Once you start to ask about planets as small as Saturn, or that are farther away than Mercury is from our sun, the methods don't work so well.\n\nThe upshot is that we really just don't know how many planets a typical star has. Some probably have none. How many have none? We don't know. How many have ten smallish planets? We don't know. At best we can guess, say 4-5 on average. This would give close to a trillion planets in our galaxy. The number could easily be a tenth of this, though.
117937
Actually you can look at all the other stars in our galaxy and via rather simple mathematics make a point of view outside the galaxy. So, more or less, making a simple computer program for it and feeding it all the coordinates that we have on the other stars, then adding our own star as 0,0,0 and voila - a picture of the galaxy and an arrow pointing at us.
77735
Some stars might have a solar system, but not all do.  Some stars are actually two "suns" orbiting around one another (called a binary star) but appearing to the unaided eye as a single star.  Some are even three stars together, such as alpha centauri, which is the closest "star" in the sky--though it is actually three stars that look like one.  Some are stellar clusters, where many of these "suns" are all bunched close enough to appear as one star.  Some are entire galaxies, with billions of stars, but so far away that they appear to be a single star from earth.  Some are stellar clusters, where many of these "suns" are all bunched close enough to appear as one star.\n\nSome things you might think are stars are actually planets.\n\nSome are dead "suns," where the fuel for the nuclear fusion that makes the sun burn has all been expended, leaving a big mass of iron, that glows white-hot for many years before turning dark.  If you look at these so-called "white dwarves" through a powerful telescope, you can see a faint ring of matter that has been blown away in the explosion that came when the star died.  Some stars are huge, and some are small.\n\nSome of the stars we have been able to see have solar systems of their own, which we detect by the slight wobble caused by the gravitational pull of the planet (or planets) as it orbits.
1116091
Right now, Farlack of the Geltrans on Planet Flibbering, orbiting the Dog star of Mecaea is asking the same thing of his peers on their version of the internet.\n\nBut seriously... all those stars... billions of them are all suns.  If only half of them have a few planets revolving around them, one of them has to have life on it.