Joel Kontinen
A new paper by Jessica Spake (a PhD student at the University of Exeter, UK) and colleagues published in Nature discloses the weirdness of WASP-107b, a hot Jupiter-sized exoplanet that has an atmosphere containing helium. It also has a comet-like tail.
Located in the constellation Virgo some 200 light years from us, WASP-107b orbits its star every 5,7 days. At 500º C (932º F), it is one of the hottest exoplanets.
While this bizarre world is as big as Jupiter, its mass is only one-eighth of Jupiter’s.
Many exoplanets tend to be weird, which suggests that Earth is most probably unique, created to sustain life.
Some foreign worlds, such as WASP-12b, are extremely hot. WASP-121b is so hot that it can cause iron to boil.
Our entire solar system seems to differ from all other star- planet systems.
Despite making big headlines, no exoplanet we know of is genuinely habitable.
Source:
Wenz, John. 2018. Colossal exoplanet has an enormous comet-like tail of helium. New Scientist (2 May).
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