Lewis Andrews

‘Hot Jupiters’ visualises the results of when we have been looking for heavens in the cosmos. Instead, we found various forms of hell. Throughout the cosmos, scientists look at distant solar systems in the search for exoplanets. In recent years, they’ve found numerous gas giant planets similar to the size of Jupiter. However, they found these giants way too close to their stars, within an orbit identical to or closer than Mercury is to the sun in some instances. Current theories suggest that these giants formed further out in their solar systems however either during their formation or the passing of a nearby object with a large amount of gravity disturbs its orbit, they start to migrate inward closer to their star. 

 

Referred to as ‘Hot Jupiters’, these giants display some interesting characteristics as a result of now residing close to their home star. HD 189733b, about 64 light years away orbits so close to its star it completes one orbit in 2.2 earth days and has winds of up to 5,400mph. HD 149026b has a surface temperature reaching almost 2,040c thanks to its dark appearance absorbing all its star’s heat with only a scorching hot spot on the side tidal locked to the planet. WASP-12b has an orbit lasting only 1 Earth day, has a surface temperature of 2,200c (one of the hottest planets in our galaxy) and has its atmosphere actively being stripped away by its star; about 190 quadrillion tonnes of gas is being ripped away from the planet every year. No life can exist in these hellish worlds.