(ORDO NEWS) — The core remaining from the gas giant was discovered in orbit around a distant star. The study of this object will provide new data on the structure of the bowels of the planets, the researchers said.
This dense object, about the size of Neptune, may be the remains of a gas giant, either having lost its atmosphere in some way or not having been able to form it in the early period of its existence.
According to a team led by David Armstrong of the University of Warwick, United Kingdom, this discovery of an exposed planetary core is the first in the history of science.
Lying in orbit around a star similar to our Sun, which is located about 730 light years from us, this nucleus called TOI 849 b turns so close to its parent luminary that a year “flies” through the surface of this planet in just 18 hours , and the temperature is about 1800 Kelvin.
According to Armstrong, the mass of this planet’s core is 2-3 Neptune’s masses, while the object is extremely dense – like a typical terrestrial planet. The mass of the TOI 849 b object was determined by the Doppler method using the HARPS instrument of the La Silla Observatory, Chile.
TOI 849 b is the most massive terrestrial planet discovered by scientists. The explanation for the unexpected absence of the atmosphere of such a massive planet, which easily attracts hydrogen and helium from the surrounding gas-dust cloud during its formation, may consist in the fact that the planet either lost its atmosphere after completion of its formation, for example, under the influence of tidal forces from the side of the star, or it is ” failed gas giant ”, which did not manage to form an atmosphere, for example, because matter ended in the accretion disk, the authors explained.
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