As always, the Hubble Space Telescope is looking to the stars for new exciting sights. Images of swirling galaxies are extremely common. On June 3, 2019, the Hubble Space Telescope released this photo of two exoplanets orbiting a distant star―an incredibly uncommon sight.
The system is called PDS 70 and is located in the constellation Centaurus. Less massive but larger than our sun, the star, also called V1032 Centauri, is a K5 type. K5 stars are cooler and dimmer than our sun. PDS 70 is 370 light-years from the Earth. That’s over 2.17 quadrillion (2,170,000,000,000,000) miles (3.5 quadrillion kilometers)!
In the image below, the white star represents the location of V1032 Centauri. To the left is PDS 70 b and to the right is PDS 70 c.
Right now, the only way astronomers know how to find planets is by observing the light from the stars. If there is a regular periodic dip in the signal, astronomers can infer that something is passing in front of it. Anything large enough to do this is probably a planet. While this is helpful, a measurement taken from this far leaves lots of room for error.
These planets were first imaged using the Very Large Telescope in Chile. We know that PDS 70 b is 4 to 17 times as massive as Jupiter, while PDS 70 c is 1 to 10 times as massive. The large range in these estimates is a consequence of the lack of precision in the measurement.
Astronomers are rarely able to get images like this because the stars are so big and bright and the planets are small and dim. Star light completely conceals anything coming from a distant planet. In the image above, astronomers cancelled light from the star to reveal the planets.
Once again, the Hubble Space Telescope dazzles us with the cosmos. We will have to wait to see what new sights they excite us with next time!
madison brewer 