{"id":814,"date":"2020-10-30T14:00:26","date_gmt":"2020-10-30T14:00:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thenextweb.com\/?p=1326287"},"modified":"2020-10-30T14:00:26","modified_gmt":"2020-10-30T14:00:26","slug":"nasa-says-this-planet-is-just-too-damn-hot-to-exist","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.londonchiropracter.com\/?p=814","title":{"rendered":"NASA says this planet is just too damn hot to exist"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

T<\/span>he exoplanet LTT 9779b is far more massive than our own world, and the world is nearly five times larger. Temperatures on its surface put Venus \u2014 the hottest planet in our solar system \u2014 to shame. This exoplanet, discovered just last year, is so extreme it should not exist \u2014 at least not for long.<\/p>\n

Hot Neptunes are \u2014 theoretically \u2014 worlds the size of Neptune or slightly larger than Neptune, orbiting close to their parent stars. However, such planets<\/a> were thought to be unstable, as the atmospheres would be driven off by heat from the local star.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis planet is so intensely irradiated by its star that its temperature is over 3,000 degrees Fahrenheit and its atmosphere could have evaporated entirely. Yet, our Spitzer observations show us its atmosphere via the infrared light the planet emits,\u201d Ian Crossfield, assistant professor of physics and astronomy at the University of Kansas stated.<\/p>\n

Much like the more-familiar hot Jupiters<\/a>, hot Neptunes are highly gaseous worlds, but they are not nearly as massive as their larger cousins.<\/p>\n

[Read: 4 ridiculously easy ways you can be more eco-friendly<\/span><\/a>]<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

Roughly 30 times more massive than Earth, LTT 9779 b orbits six times closer to its parent star as the Earth does from the Sun. The star at the center of this system is roughly three-quarters as massive as our own sun, and LTT 9779 is just slightly smaller than our local star.<\/p>\n

Oh, the Hot TESS!<\/h2>\n

Orbiting close to its sun<\/a>, in a region known as a Neptune desert, a year on LTT 9779 b lasts less than 24 hours. But, that is just one of the extreme conditions in this bizarre world.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis planet doesn\u2019t have a solid surface, and it\u2019s much hotter even than Mercury in our solar system \u2014 not only would lead melt in the atmosphere of this planet, but so would platinum, chromium, and stainless steel,\u201d Crossfield said.<\/p>\n

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<\/i><\/a>The TESS spacecraft opens up new details on exoplanets throughout the galaxy. Image credit: NASA\u2019s Goddard Space Flight Center\/CI Lab<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/figure>\n

This exoplanet was one of the first Neptune-sized worlds discovered by the orbiting Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS)<\/a>.<\/p>\n

In the first study of the spectra of any world discovered by TESS, researchers also created the first temperature map ever developed of a TESS planet with an atmosphere.<\/p>\n

\u201cInfrared light tells you the temperature of something and where the hotter and cooler parts of this planet are \u2014 on Earth, it\u2019s not hottest at noon; it\u2019s hottest a couple of hours into the afternoon. But on this planet, it\u2019s actually hottest just about at noon,\u201d Crossfield stated.<\/p>\n

In the video above, an introduction to exoplanets. (Video credit: National Geographic)<\/p>\n