Sutherland telescope finds a ‘Styrofoam’ planet
first discovered with the KELT-South telescope and thereafter monitored by many telescopes around the world operated by researchers at universities as well as telescopes operated by amateur astronomers.”
SAAO indicated that the KELT telescopes measured the brightness of about five million stars.
“Astronomers search for stars that seem to dim slightly at regular intervals, that can indicate a planet is orbiting that star and eclipsing it. Much larger telescopes are then used to measure the gravitational ‘wobble’ of the star – the slight tug a planet exerts on the star as it orbits – to verify that the dimming is due to a planet, and to measure the planet’s mass.”
Dr Rudi Kuhn from the SAAO, who assisted in the construction of KELTSouth, added that the planet KELT-11b orbited one of the brightest stars known to host an exoplanet and was one of the most inflated planets ever discovered.
“This enables us to make some very detailed observations of the atmospheric composition of the exoplanet using much larger telescopes, like the Southern African Large Telescope (SALT). This will help us understand how these giant planets are formed, why they have such small orbits as well as what might happen to them in the future.”