CNN —The Hubble Space Telescope captured an unexpected observation of a nearby planet that’s having its atmosphere blasted away by energetic outbursts from its star.
As the planet is blasted by radiation, its atmosphere heats to the point that it escapes the planet’s gravity and puffs out into space.
The planet gets hit with flares, X-rays and stellar wind, or a charged stream of particles released from the star.
“This creates a really unconstrained and frankly, scary, stellar wind environment that’s impacting the planet’s atmosphere,” Rockcliffe said.
Astronomers will conduct more follow-up observations of the system with Hubble to track how the planet changes in the future.
Persons:
Hubble, NASA’s, “ We’ve, ”, Keighley Rockcliffe, “, ’, ” Rockliffe, ” Rockcliffe, Rockcliffe
Organizations:
CNN, Hubble, Spitzer, Telescope, Keighley, Dartmouth College
Locations:
Hanover , New Hampshire