Huge exoplanet discovered orbiting a nearby star

A team of astronomers has discovered a new exoplanet named TOI-824 b orbiting a nearby star TOI-824 which is only 208 light-years away from us. The planet is massive in size with a mass equivalent to almost 19 times that of the Earth and has a radius equal to 3 times that of the Earth. The planet has an orbital period of 1.393 days and has a mean density of roughly 4 gm/cc making it more than twice as dense as Neptune. The discovery was made using data from the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS).

An artist’s impression of an exoplanet. Source: Alpha Coders

As the name suggests, an exoplanet is a planet outside the solar system. The first confirmed detection of an exoplanet was made in 1992 by astronomers Aleksander Wolszczan and Dale Frail. On 6 October 1995, Michel Mayor and Didier Queloz discovered the first exoplanet orbiting a Sun-like star. This discovery was groundbreaking and opened a new area of research in observational astronomy. For their discovery, they shared the 2019 Nobel Prize in Physics. As of now, more than 4,300 confirmed exoplanets have been discovered.

The Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) spent the first year of its mission searching for planets orbiting cool, nearby stars in the Southern Hemisphere and has detected over 1000 exoplanets. During detecting such exoplanets, many interesting results have surfaced such as the occurrence of a large population of exoplanets with sizes between Earth and Neptune orbiting stars of all types. Similar interesting and mysterious are the existence of "hot Jupiters" that orbit their stars with periods thousands of times shorter than our own Jupiter and the non-existence of exoplanets the size and mass of Neptune on periods shorter than 4 days. These results have flabbergasted astronomers and there is no consensus regarding the origin of such interesting and enigmatic trends.

The discovery of exoplanets has sparked significant interest in the search for extraterrestrial life. Astronomers are looking for planets that orbit in a star's habitable zone, where liquid water can exist on the surface. The team reported several interesting facts about the newly discovered exoplanet TOI-824 b. The study predicts that TOI-824 b to have a rock and iron core similar to that of the Earth and may also possess a significant primary atmosphere. The planet is hot with an equilibrium temperature of about 1200 K. The team now expects to carry out observations to understand the atmospheric characteristics of TOI-824 b in greater detail which would help us to understand more about these large exoplanets.

The study has been accepted for publication in the Astronomical Journal.

Article Information: J. A. Burt et al., "TOI-824 b: A New Planet on the Lower Edge of the Hot Neptune Desert", arXiv:2008.11732

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