{"id":24731,"date":"2021-12-08T11:00:34","date_gmt":"2021-12-08T16:00:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/hobbyspace.com\/Blog\/?p=24731"},"modified":"2021-12-06T15:04:54","modified_gmt":"2021-12-06T20:04:54","slug":"eso-vlt-spots-planet-orbiting-most-massive-star-pair-so-far","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hobbyspace.com\/Blog\/?p=24731","title":{"rendered":"ESO: VLT spots planet orbiting most massive star pair so far"},"content":{"rendered":"

The latest report from the European Southern Observatory (ESO<\/a>):<\/p>\n

ESO telescope images planet around most massive star pair to date<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

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This image shows the most massive planet-hosting star pair to date, b Centauri, and its giant planet b Centauri b. This is the first time astronomers have directly observed a planet orbiting a star pair this massive and hot.\u00a0 The star pair, which has a total mass of at least six times that of the Sun, is the bright object in the top left corner of the image, the bright and dark rings around it being optical artefacts. The planet, visible as a bright dot in the lower right of the frame, is ten times as massive as Jupiter and orbits the pair at 100 times the distance Jupiter orbits the Sun. The other bright dot in the image (top right) is a background star. By taking different images at different times, astronomers were able to distinguish the planet from the background stars.\u00a0 The image was captured by the SPHERE instrument on ESO\u2019s Very Large Telescope and using a coronagraph, which blocked the light from the massive star system and allowed astronomers to detect the faint planet.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The European Southern Observatory\u2019s Very Large Telescope (ESO\u2019s VLT) has captured an image of a planet orbiting b Centauri, a two-star system that can be seen with the naked eye. This is the hottest and most massive planet-hosting star system found to date, and the planet was spotted orbiting it at 100 times the distance Jupiter orbits the Sun. Some astronomers believed planets could not exist around stars this massive and this hot \u2014 until now.<\/p>\n

\u201cFinding a planet around b Centauri was very exciting since it completely changes the picture about massive stars as planet hosts<\/em>,\u201d<\/p>\n

explains Markus Janson, an astronomer at Stockholm University, Sweden and first author of the new study published online today in Nature<\/em>.<\/p>\n