Scientists discover exoplanet with record-breaking elongated retrograde orbit

By Alimat Aliyeva

An international team of planetary scientists has discovered in the constellation of the Charioteer a unique giant exoplanet orbiting a star in a very elongated retrograde orbit, the analogs of which astronomers have not previously encountered, Azernews reports.

The scientists noted that the study will help uncover the mechanisms of the formation of "hot Jupiters".

Planetary scientists made this discovery while studying images that were obtained by the TESS orbiting telescope while observing a large number of stars in the constellation of the Charioteer. The attention of scientists was attracted by the binary star system TIC 241249530, in the glow of which periodic fluctuations were detected, generated by the passage of the planet through the disks of these luminaries.

Observations have shown that there is an unusual planet inside it, which is a gas giant that surpasses Jupiter in mass by about five times. It makes one revolution around the central star of the TIC 241249530 system in 165 days and at the same time moves in a record-breaking elongated retrograde orbit - its farthest point is 30 times farther from the sun than the closest site.

Periodic approaches of the planet to the star, according to the researchers, "slow down" its movement in a special way, as a result of which in about a billion years its orbit will become more rounded and it will turn into a full-fledged "hot Jupiter". Similar migrations, as scientists suggest, have been experienced by many other large "hot Jupiters" found in the regions of the Milky Way closest to Earth over the past decade and a half.