06 October 2008

Newly discovered planet is denser than lead

The object, named COROT-exo-3b, is about the size of Jupiter, but packs more than 20 times the mass. It takes only 4 days and 6 hours to orbit its parent star, which is slightly larger than the Sun... As a planet, COROT-exo-3b would be the most massive and the densest found to date - more than twice as dense as lead.

“... it might just be a member of a new-found family of very massive planets that encircle stars more massive than our Sun. We’re now beginning to think that the more massive the star, the more massive the planet... "

No comments:

Post a Comment

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...