An international team of researchers, as reported by RIA Novosti, has released new information about the planet KELT-9b, which orbits a star in the constellation Cygnus at a distance of about 620 light years from us.
The named exoplanet was discovered back in 2016 by the Kilodegree Extremely Little Telescope (KELT) observatory. The body is so close to its star that the surface temperature reaches 4300 degrees Celsius. This means that life on the planet cannot exist.
Planet KELT-9b is so hot that hydrogen molecules in its atmosphere are splitting apart. This is exactly the conclusion that scientists came to after analyzing the available information.
Hydrogen fission is observed on the day side of the exoplanet. At the same time, the opposite process occurs on the night side.
In addition, on the night side of KELT-9b, ionized iron and titanium atoms can condense into clouds from which metallic rain falls.
Let us add that the named exoplanet is hotter than many stars. The period of its revolution around its star is only 1,48 Earth days. Moreover, the planet is approximately three times heavier than Jupiter.
Source: 3dnews.ru