Figure 8-15: R I V U X G
Imaging Extrasolar Planets (a) Four planets can be seen orbiting the star HR 8799. The star is about 129 light-years from Earth and can be seen with the naked eye on a clear night. In capturing this image, special techniques make the star less visible to reduce its glare and reveal its planets. The white arrows indicate possible trajectories that each star might take over the next ten years. (b) About 170 light-years away, the star 2M1207 and a planet with about 1.5 times the diameter of Jupiter are captured in this infrared image. First observed in 2004, this extrasolar planet was the first to be visible in a telescopic image. At infrared wavelengths a star outshines a Jupiter-sized planet by only about 100 to 1, compared to 109 to 1 at visible wavelengths, making imaging possible in the infrared.
Imaging Extrasolar Planets (a) Four planets can be seen orbiting the star HR 8799. The star is about 129 light-years from Earth and can be seen with the naked eye on a clear night. In capturing this image, special techniques make the star less visible to reduce its glare and reveal its planets. The white arrows indicate possible trajectories that each star might take over the next ten years. (b) About 170 light-years away, the star 2M1207 and a planet with about 1.5 times the diameter of Jupiter are captured in this infrared image. First observed in 2004, this extrasolar planet was the first to be visible in a telescopic image. At infrared wavelengths a star outshines a Jupiter-sized planet by only about 100 to 1, compared to 109 to 1 at visible wavelengths, making imaging possible in the infrared.
(a: NASA/W. M. Keck Observatory; b: ESO/VLT/NACO)