Distant planet gets its weather mapped

[cro-man]

HD 149026b is a sweltering 3,700 degrees Fahrenheit, so hot that astronomers believe it is absorbing almost all of the heat from its star, and reflecting very little to no light.

Curious hot and cold spots, indicating the presence of roaring winds faster than the speed of sound, adorn the first weather "map" of a planet orbiting a nearby star.

A team of astronomers Wednesday unveiled the map of the planet, labeled HD 189733b, that orbits scorchingly close to a star 63 light-years away. The angle of the orbit allows astronomers to see its passage in front of its star every 2.2 days.

"The real surprise is how well we did in seeing these features," says lead researcher Heather Knutson of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics. "We're seeing large features in the planet's atmosphere."

The scientists created the map by using NASA's Spitzer space telescope, which can pick up heat from distant planets. As the planet passes in front of the star and then behind, they subtract the light from the star from the combined images to calculate the leftover light from the planet. Data can then be examined to identify distinct weather patterns.

The planet appears to have a 1,720-degree "bull's-eye" and a cooler patch of 1,291 degrees nearby, Knutson says.

Source: USA Today

[Kelsenellenelvian]

This **** is awesome!!!