Exoplanets come in many sizes and sometimes even unusual shapes, and the European Space Agency’s CHEOPS exoplanet-hunting telescope has discovered a rugby ball-shaped planet, pulled into that shape by intense gravitational forces, according to a digitaltrend report.
The planet, called WASP-103b in the constellation Hercules, experiences epic tidal forces due to orbiting near its star and with each year it only lasts one day. Very big tides on this planet.
“But we have not yet been able to verify this,” study co-author Jan Alibert, professor of astrophysics at the University of Bern, explained in a statement.
Using CHEOPS, the team was able to verify the tidal deformation of the planet by looking at its transit. When the planet passes between its star and Earth in an event called a transit, the team can measure the drop in brightness from the star and identify the planet. Deformation measurement.
“It’s incredible that we’ve been able to do this – it’s the first time that such an analysis has been done,” said co-author Babatunde Akinsanmi.
In addition to measuring its strange shape, the researchers were also able to learn regarding the planet’s interior by seeing how it deformed, and Akinsanmi explained that “the resistance of a material to deformation depends on its composition,” “We can only see the tides on Earth in the oceans and the rocky part does not move much so through By measuring how much a planet is deformed, we can determine how much it is made of rock, gas, or water.”
The results suggest that the planet is internally similar to Jupiter, although it is twice its size, so the researchers believe the planet may have swelled due to the warming of the nearby star.
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