New Transiting Extrasolar Planet

Shooter6947 writes "A new transiting extrasolar planet has been announced -- the only other known object that passes between its star and the Earth each orbit, a situation known as a transit, is HD209458b. The new planet, OGLE-TR-56b, is 0.9 times the mass of our own Jupiter and 1.3 times Jupiter's radius. It is the closest-in extrasolar planet yet found, with its year being only 1.2 days! Read about it from a cnn.com article or from the original scientific paper."

Comments

Re:Sounds like paradise

[Captain Nitpick]

Wouldn't this be more likely to be a very large rocky object? That close to the star, I'd expect volatiles to be stripped.

The writeup says the planet has 0.9 times Jupiter's mass, and the article says it has a temperature of 3100 F. This probably means it is not a true gas giant (whoopsie), but it is still hot enough to melt silicon and iron, so there's still no solid surface. Imagine a planet of magma. Were it to cool off, it should become a very large rocky object.

As it is, there's nothing to land on, and it's too hot for a ship to survive. And even if it were cool enough to safely land on, the gravity would be too high for human habitation.