Magnetic fields may protect potentially habitable planets from their parent stars
In the search for habitable planets around other stars, the easiest to see are those around small, dim stars because a planet passing in front blocks more of its light.
But astronomers have long assumed that such planets, which would reside in very close-in orbits, won’t have a magnetic field—essentially for deflecting life-threatening winds of charged particles streaming from the star.
But by combining computer models of planetary orbits with those of heat in planetary interiors, researchers have made the counterintuitive prediction that extreme tides help planets dissipate heat, cooling them enough to create a protective magnetic field.