An artist’s rendering shows the planet HD 20782, the most eccentric planet ever known, passing its star in close orbit. Credit: NASA
Extrasolar planet swings around its star like it’s a comet. Led by SF State Uni astronomer Stephen Kane, a team has spotted an extrasolar planet about 117 light-years from earth that boasts the most eccentric orbit yet seen. They detected a signal of reflected light from the planet HD 20782 – a “flash” of starlight bouncing off the eccentric planet’s atmosphere as it made its closest orbital approach to its star.
In this case, “eccentric” refers to how elliptical a planet’s orbit is around its star...
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