New Clues about Hot Neptunes
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Read the news release: https://science.nasa.gov/universe/exoplanets/discovery-alert-a-hot-neptune-in-a-tight-orbit/
Produced by the Space Telescope Science Institute’s Office of Public Outreach in collaboration with NASA’s Universe of Learning partners: Caltech/IPAC, Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian, and NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
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- Artist's concept of TOI-3261 b: NASA/JPL-Caltech/K. Miller (Caltech/IPAC)
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A montage of stellar photography including galaxies, star fields, colorful nebulae, and images of ringed planets and the surface of Jupiter. Text, News From the Universe. December 6, 2024. New Clues About Hot Neptunes. An artist’s concept of a red and green gaseous world close to a large yellow sun. Its atmosphere streaks off into space against intense solar wind in the direction opposite the star. NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (Tess) has discovered a Neptune-sized planet, TOI-3261 B, in close orbit around its star. One “year,” or full orbit, on TOI-3261 B only takes 21 hours. It is very rare to find Neptune-sized planets so close to the extreme radiation and gravity of their stars that have not had their atmosphere totally stripped away. As the fourth example of a confirmed “hot Neptune,” TOI-3261 B is giving scientists more clues about how these planets form and survive. Scientists think that hot Neptunes like this may have started out as much larger, Jupiter-sized planets, but lost a large portion of their mass.
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This news was brought to you in part by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.