HAT-P-26b tagged posts

The atmosphere of the distant “warm Neptune” HAT-P-26b, illustrated here, is unexpectedly primitive, composed primarily of hydrogen and helium. By combining observations from NASA’s Hubble and Spitzer space telescopes, researchers determined that, unlike Neptune and Uranus, the exoplanet has relatively low metallicity, an indication of the how rich the planet is in all elements heavier than hydrogen and helium. Credit: NASA/GSFC

A pioneering new study uncovering the ‘primitive atmosphere’ surrounding a distant world could provide a pivotal breakthrough in the search to how planets form and develop in far-flung galaxies...

This artist’s concept depicts a planetary system. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

HAT-P-26b is an inflated, Neptune-mass exoplanet 437 light years from Earth, which orbits its parent star HAT-P-26 every 4.23 days. The planet has a relatively low surface gravity that is well suited for atmospheric characterization. To determine composition of HAT-P-26b’s atmosphere and finding traces of water vapor in it, the scientists made use of data provided by the Low Dispersion Survey Spectrograph 3C (LDSS-3C) instrument and NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope. LDSS-3C is an optical imager and (multi-) slit spectrograph on the 6.5m Magellan II (Clay) telescope, Chile.

They observed the primary transit of HAT-P-26b with LDSS-3C on Apr...