A gas giant planet with a density comparable to cotton candy has been discovered at a distance of 1232 light years from Earth. The name of this planet is ‘WASP-193b’. Its diameter is about 1.5 times larger than that of Jupiter, but its mass is only one-seventh that of wood.
The research team, led by Khalid Barkaoui of the University of Liège in Belgium, announced that the density of ‘WASP-193b’ is estimated to be 0.059g/cm3, similar to that of cotton candy at 0.05g/cm3. . That’s just over 1% of Earth’s density.
The researchers speculate that because ‘WASP-193b’ is near a star, the heat from the star causes the planet’s atmosphere to expand and become dense like cotton candy. Until the discovery of ‘Cotton Candy Planet’, it was known in the academic world that in order to become a gas planet the same size as Jupiter, the planet’s core must be 10 times the mass of Earth to hold gas. ” core was found to be less than four times the mass of the Earth, disproving the existing hypothesis. The recently discovered ‘WASP-193b’ is 1.5 times larger than the previously discovered ‘WASP-107 b’. The largest cotton candy planet ever discovered.
Since cotton candy planets have not been studied to date, they are considered ideal for planetary evolution studies. NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope, set to launch later this year, is expected to provide accurate data on the composition of Cotton Candy Planet’s atmosphere.
image source │University of Colorado at Boulder