An international team of astronomers are baffled after discovering an "impossible planet" the size of Jupiter – which could even host life.

Of the thousands of planets discovered outside the solar system, most orbit stars that will eventually evolve into red giants and then white dwarfs as part of their natural life cycle.

During a star's red giant phase, any planets caught in too close an orbit will be engulfed. Further away planets can survive and continue to orbit around the following white dwarf, although at a distance.

Until now there's been no evidence that planets can survive intact while in close orbit around white dwarfs.

However a group of astronomers from around the world using NASA's Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite and the retired Spitzer Space Telescope recently observed a giant planet candidate "transiting" the white dwarf WD 1856+534 (TIC 267574918) every 1.4 days.

Transiting means when a planet eclipses its orbit star, from the perspective of observers on Earth.

The planet, believed to be around the same size as Jupiter, seems to be intact and locked in a tight orbit with the white dwarf, something previously thought to be impossible.

Researchers involved in the discovery, which was published in the journal Nature, say it defies much of what we know about the formation of planets.

Andrew Vanderburg, an assistant professor of astronomy at the University of Wisconsin-Madison who contributed to the paper, says one of the defining features of a white dwarf is that it tends to pull in celestial bodies with its strong gravity and destroy them in the process.

If the newly-discovered planet is verified to be intact, it will be an unprecedented discovery.

"The explanation that we think is the most likely is that there were other planets in the system or other objects in the system," Prof Vanderburg told Salon.

"We know that there are two other stars orbiting this white dwarf very far away. Maybe they could have exerted some influence on this planet that we saw back when it was orbiting far away originally because it had to be orbiting far away, or it would have been engulfed.

"It could have changed its orbit so that it was very, very elliptical, and then when it came in close to the star, it just barely grazed the surface."

The alternative explanation is that the planet avoided being engulfed by the white dwarf through its sheer density.

Prof Vanderburg says the discovery is particularly exciting because it suggests new types of planets existing in a "habitable zone" on which we can search for life.

"I think the biggest implication for this is that there's a possibility for life to be in places that we hadn't really considered before," he said.

"In a white dwarf system there's also a habitable zone, but because the white dwarf is really tiny and it's cooling off and is really, really faint, you have to huddle a lot closer to that star in order for it to be potentially habitable."

Source: https://www.dailystar.co.uk/news/weird-news/scientists-discover-impossible-planet-possibility-22705062

Certainty of life out there.... Science, myth, or divine creation?

Beautiful

This is why I love science

It keeps evolving with new discoveries, providing solutions to human problems unlike religion which is stagnated.

God is really great...This is awesome

Atheist will love this...

Okay, make them go bring Wetin worst pass Corona come this planet

merieam16:
Yea, buh who created those things that they keep discovering

I don't know, do you know?

Life!!

Whatever you guys are doing just don't bring other lifeforms to destroy the earth's population

Having 'Possibility For Life' .....oyinbo can talk lie

An organism from that plant would be an unstoppable force here on earth. Like a real life superman.

Datz una wan go scatter dat place as una do hia no go wrk 4 una

TBH, science has done more harm than good.
A good example is this covid-19 pandemic, at end of the day we will all praise science for giving us the vaccine but what we are forgetting is what brought the virus in the first place.

let me start parking

That's why I love science. Alot of ethereal endless interesting discoveries... Next level...checking for the possible living organisms therein. GOD IS GREAT!

Ok. They have started again o. Why are these people looking for what is not lost all the time?

merieam16:
Yea, buh who created those things that they keep discovering

No one can say for sure.

MemoriesAndMe:
Ok. They have started again o. Why are these opinions people looking for what is not lost all the time?

If someone in the times past didn't"look for what is no lost", you probably would have died of something as simple as malaria.

ggirl4real:
Beautiful

This is why I love science

It keeps evolving with new discoveries, providing solutions to human problems unlike religion which is stagnated.

Science is a name given to the natural evolution of man... Science will not receive your soul, Jesus will.

OJay360:
TBH, science has done more harm than good.
A good example is this covid-19 pandemic, at the of the day we will all praise science for giving us the virus but what we are forgetting is what brought the virus in the first place.

Did science give you malaria, typhoid, tuberculosis and other diseases too many to mention? Yet it gave you cures for all of them. Be grateful bro.

All this una discovery self, I tire.
Can someone discover how Nigeria can be any better?

This people don come again �

Okay, but tell us how many light years it takes to get there

A

OJay360:
TBH, science has done more harm than good.
A good example is this covid-19 pandemic, at the of the day we will all praise science for giving us the virus but what we are forgetting is what brought the virus in the first place.

if no be science you for no they type this nonsense from your phone

emorse:

Did science give you malaria, typhoid, tuberculosis and other diseases too many to mention? Yet it gave you cures for all of them. Be grateful bro.

Like I said what caused all these diseases in the first place

OJay360:
Like I said what caused all these diseases in the first place

What caused the ones in ancient times and even Bible days
Do u know that in the past, people who had high fever were killed as witches and wizards when they display symptoms but for the invention of medicine

Macsjebs:

What caused the ones in ancient times and even Bible days
Do u know that in the past, people who had high fever were killed as witches and wizards when they display symptoms but for the invention of medicine

Science didn't begin now, it started long ago even in Bible days and is not that I am against science, in fact am still pursuing a degree in pharmacy but it's just that science is used in a wrong way, I mean, nuclear bombs that can sink a city, it shows that with the help of science we have people with the mindset of destroy a nation. Like I said before about science doing more harm than good, it means science does good but we keep forgetting the bad side.