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Scientists have discovered a new planet called KELT-11b. The planet is so light that it can float if placed in a large enough body of water. According to the Daily Galaxy report, the European Space Agency (ESA) declared on March 25 that its characteristic Exoplanet satellite space telescope (CHEOPS) is ready for future space missions.
CHEOPS measurements of different celestial bodies are five times more accurate compared to ordinary Earth-based telescopes. The space agency passed responsibility for operating CHEOPS to the mission consortium, a group that includes scientists and engineers from 30 different institutions located in 11 European countries.
(Photo: Pixabay)
Scientists found a super light alien planet! The planet can even float in a pool, they say!
CHEOPS was first launched in December 2019, opening its eye to the universe in late January, and shortly thereafter took its first blurry photos of the stars.
The blurred image is the result of the mission’s strategy of intentionally blurring the telescope’s lenses to further diffuse light from distant stars over many pixels for more precise measurement precision.
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Scientists found a super light alien planet! The planet can even float in a pool, they say!
One of the stars the team observed is HD 93396. The planetary system is located in the constellations of Sextans, which is 320 light-years from Earth.
The star, which is three times larger than the Sun, is where the giant exoplanet KELT-11b is located. KELT-11b, which was first discovered in 2016, orbits the star in 4.7 days.
This particular system caught the attention of scientists due to the massive size of the star, making it take a long time for the exoplanet to pass in front of it, almost 8 hours.
(Photo: Pixabay)
Scientists found a super light alien planet! The planet can even float in a pool, they say!
“This gave CHEOPS the opportunity to demonstrate its ability to capture long traffic events that would otherwise be difficult to observe from the ground, as the ‘astronomical’ part of the night for terrestrial astronomy generally takes less than eight hours. “said Didier Queloz, a professor in the Department of Astronomy at the Faculty of Science at the University of Geneva and a spokesperson for the CHEOPS Science team, as stated in the Daily Science report.
CHEOPS was able to determine the size of KELT-11b due to its transit around the star. The exoplanet’s diameter is 181,600 kilometers that CHEOPS was able to measure with an accuracy of 4,290 kilometers.
KELT-11b is a supermassive exoplanet that exceeds the diameter of the largest planet in the Solar System. Jupiter’s diameter is 139,900 kilometers, while Earth has a diameter of 12,700 kilometers.
Although it is larger compared to Jupiter, the mass of the exoplanet is 5 times less, which means that it has an extremely low density.
“It would float on water in a large enough pool,” said David Ehrenreich in the report. He is the scientist for the CHEOPS mission at the University of Geneva. He also explained that the reason behind the low density is attributed to the planet’s proximity to its star.
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