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Exoplanet So Massive They’re Not Even Sure It’s A Planet

Tuesday, November 20, 2012 23:48
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(Before It's News)

Kappa And b could be a super-Jupiter, or it could be a brown dwarf–the exoplanet orbiting a nearby star is so big scientists aren’t quite sure what to call it.

By Clay DillowPosted 11.20.2012


 

Kappa Andromedae System Left: False-color, near-infrared image of Kappa Andromedae system. Right: A signal-to-noise ratio mapped, produced from the image to the left.NAOJ

You know we’ve found something new and interesting when scientists don’t really know how to classify it. Using the Subaru Telescope an international team of astronomers has discovered a “super-Jupiter” so massive that it seems they’re not quite sure whether to call it a planet or a low-mass brown dwarf (in other words, a star that failed to fire). Located roughly 170 light-years from Earth, the host star is roughly 2.5 times more massive than the sun and its planet is about 13 times larger than Jupiter, making this the highest-mass star to ever host a directly imaged orbital companion–especially one of this size.

Kappa Andromedae is part of what’s known as the Columba stellar moving group, and at just 30 million years old it is relatively young (our Sun is estimated to be more like five billion hears old). That’s significant if only for the mode of discovery–young stars are good targets for directly imaging exoplanets because their planets (also young) tend to retain more heat leftover from the formation process and thus reveal themselves more readily via infrared emissions. That’s how the researchers were able to zero in on Kappa And b, the super-Jupiter orbiting Kappa Andromedae at a distance about 1.8 times Neptune’s distance from the Sun, over the glare of its host star.

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