What do you know about Rogue Planets in our Milky Way?
Posted By RichC on May 4, 2025
Rogue planets, also known as free-floating planets, are planetary bodies that drift through the Milky Way without orbiting a star. Unlike typical planets bound to a stellar system, these objects roam interstellar space, 
untethered by a parent star’s gravity. They’re intriguing because they challenge our understanding of planetary formation and survival in the harsh environment of deep space.
Key Characteristics:
Rogue planets don’t orbit stars, so they lack external heat sources. Any warmth comes from internal processes like radioactive decay or residual formation heat.
According to Grok AI:
The image references a rogue planet in the Milky Way, described as a free-floating world with a mass nearly 13 times that of Jupiter, not orbiting any star, and featuring bright auroras powered by a magnetic field four million times stronger than Earth’s.
This description closely matches SIMP J01365663+0933473, a known object discovered in 2017 by the Very Large Array (VLA). Initially classified as a brown dwarf, it was later suggested to be a rogue planet due to its mass (around 12.7 Jupiter masses) and lack of a host star. Located about 20 light-years away, it exhibits strong auroras caused by an intense magnetic field—estimated to be over 4 million times stronger than Earth’s—interacting with charged particles in its vicinity. This magnetic field drives powerful radio emissions, which is how it was detected.
The planet’s auroras are far brighter than those on Jupiter due to its extreme magnetic activity, despite not being powered by a stellar wind (since it’s not orbiting a star). Its size and mass place it near the boundary between rogue planets and brown dwarfs, making it a fascinating subject for studying planetary magnetic fields and formation processes.
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