Hubble detects evaporating planet
JUL 02, 2012
DOI: 10.1063/PT.5.026139
National Geographic : Via the Hubble Space Telescope, astronomers have observed an extreme space-weather event on a planet outside our solar system. About 60 light-years from Earth, HD 189733b “burped” off some of its atmospheric gas following a violent flare on its parent star. Scientists surmise that because the Jupiter-like planet orbits so close to its star, the solar flare could have heated the gas molecules in the planet’s upper atmosphere to tens of thousands of degrees Celsiusâmdash;hot enough to cause them to speed up and escape the planet’s gravitational pull. Such atmospheric evaporation could be responsible for the few tightly orbiting Earth-size planets that have been discovered recently, writes Ker Than for National Geographic News.
© 2012 American Institute of Physics
