NEWSFLASH: Possible planet of a Sun-like star imaged for the first time

[JonathanN]

Hello all,

This news has just come in. Canadian astronomers have unveiled what is likely to be the first picture of a planet around a normal star similar to the Sun.

Details at: www.spaceinfo.com.au

Cheers!

Jonathan


Jonathan Nally
Editor
SpaceInfo.com.au
www.spaceinfo.com.au

[Matty P (Matt)]

What an amazing discovery! A great read as well.

Thanks for the heads up Jonathan.

[Kevnool (Kev)]

You would think it must be really close to its sun to be so reflective ......but in the story its a very long way away from its parent .....so how is it so reflective...cheers Kev.

[seeker372011 (Narayan)]

if it is confirmed than that's spectacular..happened sooner than one would have expected

[drmorbius (Randall)]

Wow... that's amazing. Thanks for the heads up!

[ngcles]

Originally Posted by Kevnool

You would think it must be really close to its sun to be so reflective ......but in the story its a very long way away from its parent .....so how is it so reflective...cheers Kev.

Hi Kev & All,

I think the clues here are that it was imaged at near infrared wavelengths, that the temprature of the planet-like object was 1500k, it is estimated at 8-times the mass of Jupiter and that it is "young". The "light" in the pic is therefore probably infra red radiation emitted by the candidate planet itself and probably not reflected light from the alleged parent star.

Will be quite a while I think (at 330 AU assumed orbital distance) before it can be proven to be orbiting the star and not an interloper. The odds of it being an interloper are pretty low though you'd think.

Best,

Les D