Astronomers have discovered an exoplanet spinning very close to the red dwarf GJ 740, 36 light years from Earth.
According to a report from the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics, the new planet named GJ 740 b has a radius and mass 1.4 and 3 times larger than Earth, respectively. It revolves around the red dwarf GJ 740 at such a close distance that it only takes 2.4 days to complete an orbit.
“This is the planet with the second shortest known orbital period around this star (the red dwarf). Its mass and orbital period reveal that it is a rocky planet, which can be confirmed. observations from NASA’s TESS Alien Hunting Telescope in the future, ”said astronomer Borja Toledo Padrón of the Institut Astruto de Astrofísica de Canarias (IAC), lead author of the study.
The GJ 740 b was discovered by the spectrophotometer duo HARPS-N at the Telescopio Nazionale Galileo observatory and CARMENES at the Calar Alto observatory in Spain by radial speed technique. This technique relies on small variations in a star’s speed, often caused by the gravitational pull of an object in its orbit around it, to determine the existence of the planet.
The data also revealed that there could be another planet as heavy as Saturn (nearly 100 times the mass of Earth) orbiting GJ 740 with an orbital period of up to 9 years. However, the team needs more observations to confirm that this radial velocity signal is caused by the planet or the star’s magnetic cycle.
The red dwarf GJ 740 is located in the constellation Cu Xa, 36 light years from Earth. It has a radius and mass only 0.56 and 0.58 times the Sun. This dwarf also spins very close to another star with an orbital period of only 35.56 days.
