A team of scientists, including one from Bucknell University in Pennsylvania, has discovered a new exoplanet located in the Beta Pictoris moving group that is believed to be more than eight times the size of Jupiter.
The massive world, designated as PSO J318.5338-22.8603, is considered to be one of a handful of identified exoplanets that can be directly-imaged and observed through spectroscopy. This makes it a key element in helping researchers better understand the formation and evolution of such planets in space.
Discovering Exoplanets
Planets that exist beyond the Solar System are difficult to identify since they cannot be observed by scientists directly. They are often detected only when they travel in front of their host star. This is often how members of the Kepler mission are able to locate exoplanets.
Once an exoplanet is identified, scientists would then determine its properties by studying its gravitational interactions with its host star as well as with other planets found in its system.
While conducting an inference of a newly-discovered exoplanet can reveal a number of information about it, carrying out a spectroscopy of the subject world is considered to be a different matter altogether.
PSO J318.5338-22.8603
In a study featured in The Astrophysical Journal, Katelyn Allers, a physics and astronomy professor at Bucknell University, led a team of researchers in studying the rotational and radial velocities of the exoplanet PSO J318.5338-22.8603 through the use of the Gemini North telescope as well as its near-infrared spectrograph.
The team discovered that PSO is part of a group of young stars sharing a common motion through space known as the Beta Pictoris moving group. They also determined the age of PSO by comparing it with the other exoplanets in their group.
With PSO's age identified, Allers and her colleagues were then able to confirm that the object is indeed a rogue planet and not a brown dwarf, which is used to refer to "failed stars" that did not have enough mass to start a fusion process.
The researchers found that PSO contained a mass of about 8.3 + or - 0.5 times that of Jupiter and a planetary temperature of about 1130 kelvin (1,130 Celsius).
Data from the Gemini North telescope revealed that the new exoplanet has a rotation of about five hours to 10.2 hours, and that has a radial velocity that is similar to the values seen in other Beta Pictoris members.
The researchers believe that being able to identify these properties has allowed them to tag PSO J318.5338-22.8603 as a vital part in their study of relatively young planets that are accessible through direct imaging.
PSO is known to occupy an intermediate position in relation to the other planets included in the Beta Pictoris moving group. In 2014, scientists were able to directly-imaged another planet, designated as 51 Eridani-b, which is only slightly larger than Jupiter.
Researchers also located another exoplanet in the group, which was given the name Beta Pictoris b. This world is considered to be about 11 times as large as Jupiter.
Photo: NASA Blueshift | Flickr
