Interesting Planet Apparently Heating Its Star

T. Panimaesh writes "A Canadian graduate student has discovered a planet which is heating the star it rotates around. 'Evgenya Shkolnik detected a spot on HD179949 that was 700 degrees warmer than the surrounding areas and circled the star at the same pace as the planet's orbit, once every three days. First seen in 2001, it also appeared in two sets of observations in 2002. It is probably not an intrinsic feature of the star, which takes nine days to rotate. Instead, the planet appears to possess a magnetic field that interacts with the star's magnetic field.' The 'roaster' planet being studied is almost as big as Jupiter, a gas giant planet in our solar system, and has 270 times the mass of Earth. It moves at 150 Kilometres per second, completing it's orbit in just 3.5 days."

Comments

A what, now?

[duggy_92127]

...is almost as big as Jupiter, a gas giant planet in our solar system, and has...

Woah, back up there. This 'Jupiter' you speak of, it's a what, now? A planet, here in our solar system? Wow! Please, tell me more!

Doug