by Astronomers think they've detected an extremely rare, luminous phenomenon known as a "glory" in the hellish atmosphere of a distant exoplanet.
If the finding is confirmed, it would be the first time one of these rainbow-colored light shows has been spotted outside the solar system.
The exoplanet, WASP-76 b, is located around 637 light-years from Earth.
It was first discovered in 2013 by the Wide Angle Search for Planets (WASP) project, which looks for planets as they pass between, or transit, their parent star and Earth.
The exoplanet — which may have cannibalized a smaller, Mercury-size neighbor in the past — is around 90% the mass of Jupiter but about twice as wide.
It is unusually close to its home star, orbiting around 20 times closer than Mercury orbits the sun.
As a result, it takes WASP-76 b just 1.8 days to complete one trip around its star.
Source
If the finding is confirmed, it would be the first time one of these rainbow-colored light shows has been spotted outside the solar system.
The exoplanet, WASP-76 b, is located around 637 light-years from Earth.
It was first discovered in 2013 by the Wide Angle Search for Planets (WASP) project, which looks for planets as they pass between, or transit, their parent star and Earth.
The exoplanet — which may have cannibalized a smaller, Mercury-size neighbor in the past — is around 90% the mass of Jupiter but about twice as wide.
It is unusually close to its home star, orbiting around 20 times closer than Mercury orbits the sun.
As a result, it takes WASP-76 b just 1.8 days to complete one trip around its star.
Source
