A young massive planet Beta Pictoris b was discovered in 2008, and since the end of 2014, for two years, scientists have tracked its movement in the orbit of the parent star until it disappeared from view, approaching the outer halo of the star so much that it is no longer visible even for the most accurate tools.
Using the SPHERE receiver on the Very Large Telescope (VLT) of the European Southern Observatory (ESO), astronomers received a unique series of images of the exoplanet Beta Pictoris b.
It has been almost two years since the images of the planet and the stars merged, and now the Beta Pictoris b was again separated from the circumstellar halo, which was noticed by the SPHERE receiver. After subtracting the brightness of the star Beta Pictoris (Beta Painter), a unique set of images of the planet’s long-period orbit was created on the basis of the full series of images obtained.
The uniqueness of this situation is that SPHERE receives live images of Beta Pictoris b, not computed and modeled. Most of the known exoplanets are openly indirect methods – from observations of their influence on the position or brilliance of the parent star. The SPHERE receiver specializes in taking direct pictures by photographing exoplanets directly. This method is extremely difficult to implement and allowed to directly observe distant worlds, such as this one.
Beta Pictoris b lives 63 light years from Earth. It is about 1.3 billion kilometers away from its star. The surface of the young planet is still very hot – its temperature is 1,500 °C, and it glows with its own light, which helped the SPHERE receiver to see it and trace the orbital motion. When looking at the presented images it may seem that the planet passes through the star’s disk, slightly eclipsing it. But in reality, Beta Pictoris b does not transit.
The resulting images are an outstanding achievement. They mark a new era in one of the most fascinating and technically difficult areas of astronomy – the discovery and exploration of exoplanets.
Beta Pictoris b – a distant giant planet
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