Sunday, September 4, 2022

Tilted kilt

Per Keith Cooper: 3D Orbital Architecture of a Dwarf Binary System and Its Planetary Companion. The binary is EQ Pegasi alias GJ 896; the planet orbits A. Both are red dwarfs. So the planet orbiting 284.4 days is COLD. You hardly need ask Kepler to know this.

It has helped that the system is near us - 20.3 lightyears - so has been observed for some time, since 1941. Long observations and a big mass mean good constraints. Even without JWST.

More concerning is Newton. How can a planet in the Mj range even... form, here? Without the B star stealing all the planet's gas, before yeeting its core into deep space. It seems that here the planet is best modeled if it tilts at 148°. Incidentally yielding that exact mass: 2.3 Mj.

SYFY 9/15: How it was found. That might be the most-interesting part of the story - radio-astronomy from all over this Earth.

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