(ORDO NEWS) — Thanks to the success of the Kepler mission, we know that there are many planets like the Hot Jupiters. These are gas giants that spin so close to their stars that they have extremely high temperatures.
They also have exotic atmospheres, and these atmospheres contain many oddities, like alumina clouds and titanium rain.
A team of astronomers created a cloud atlas for the Hot Jupiters, describing in detail what types of clouds and atmospheres we will see when we observe different planets.
Although all Hot Jupiters are similar, they do show some differences. And these differences may dictate what we see in their atmosphere, especially over the next few years, as more powerful telescopes are being developed.
The upper mass limit for hot Jupiter is about 13.6 masses of Jupiter. After, it will fuse deuterium and become a brown dwarf. Their orbital period is from 1.2 to 111 Earth days, and the orbits are almost round, with a low eccentricity.
Many Hot Jupiters have a low density, and are tidally tied to their star. They are rare in red dwarf stars, and are often found in type F and G stars and less common in type K stars.
One of the reasons astronomers have found so many Hot Jupiters is because they are so easy to spot. When they fly in front of their stars, they block much more light than smaller planets. And since their orbital periods are so short, the chances of catching transit are pretty high.
Because the Hot Jupiters are so easy to spot, a team of astronomers has created a cloud atlas for them. Atlas is a model of various types of atmospheres and clouds that can be found on different hot Jupiters.
A team of astronomers from Canada, the UK and the USA. The lead author is Peter Gao, a research fellow at the University of California, Berkeley. Article title: “Aerosol composition of hot giant planets, in which silicates and hydrocarbon haze predominate.” The study is published in the journal Nature Astronomy.
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