COROT finds it's first exoplanet

COROT has provided its first image of a giant planet orbiting another star and the first bit of ‘seismic’ information on a far away, Sun-like star- with unexpected accuracy.

The first planet detected by COROT, now named ‘COROT-Exo-1b’, is a very hot gas giant, with a radius equal to 1.78 times that of Jupiter. It orbits a yellow dwarf star similar to our Sun with a period of about 1.5 days. ‘COROT-Exo-1b’ is situated roughly 1500 light years from us, in the direction of the constellation Unicorn (Monoceros)

small planets down to the size of our Earth – three times smaller than initially thought possible - will be in the grasp of COROT. The satellite may also be able, in specific circumstances, to detect subtle variations in the stellar light reflected by the planet itself. This would give an indication of its chemical composition.

not a really exciting planet in terms of life but nice to see COROT get its first result. The next 18 months are going to be very interesting. Expect to see new planets every month from the COROT team.

www.esa.int...

[edit on 3-5-2007 by yeti101]

Another boring gas giant

I didn't know we could detect planets 1 500 light years away !

To be correct you'd have to say we detected a planet that was orbiting that star 1500 years or so ago :p Because for all we know, something happend to it since :p

yeah gas giants are boring these days,

but its good the telescope is performing so well. shouldnt be long before they find the first earth sized planet in the HZ of a red dwarf.

[edit on 4-5-2007 by yeti101]