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BY STEVEN SPARKMAN
ANCHOR GARY COTTON
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Astronomers peering into other galaxies have found something bizarre -- a black planet. It’s the darkest that’s been discovered. CNN has the details.
“The Jupiter-sized planet absorbs 99% of light that reaches it. That’s darker than coal and significantly less reflective than black acrylic paint. This newly-discovered planet is about 750 million light years from Earth, with surface temperatures believed to be about 1800 degrees."
The find comes thanks to NASA’s Kepler spacecraft. The telescope measures the brightness of stars, watching for the brief dips in brightness that happen when a planet passes over its star. Once they’ve found a planet, they can learn a little more about it. BBC explains how.
“They measured the amount of light coming from the planet's ‘night side’ -- when it is directly in front of its star. They compared that to the light coming from its ‘day side’, just before it passes behind its star and Kepler sees it bathed in light. The difference between the two gives a measure of how much light the planet reflects...”
That measurement -- called the “albedo” -- tells scientists something about the planet’s atmosphere. Earth has an albedo around 33%, varying with cloud cover. But this new planet -- less than 1%.
But one researcher told Discovery News -- there’s still something to see.
“However, it’s not completely pitch black. It’s so hot that it emits a faint red glow, much like a burning ember or the coils on an electric stove.”
Scientists still aren’t clear what makes this planet so dark. Part of it is the planet’s heat -- it’s just too hot to have reflective clouds. But there’s more to the mystery.
A writer for Space.com explains.
“The researchers propose that light-absorbing chemicals such as vaporized sodium and potassium or gaseous titanium oxide in the planet's atmosphere could he’lp explain why it is so dark. Still, none of these can fully explain why the world is as stealthily cloaked as it is.”
The black planet sits in the constellation Draco -- the dragon.
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