Free Astronomy Magazine March-April 2022

37 MARCH-APRIL 2022 ASTRO PUBLISHING found. Moreover, it moves around the star system in one of the widest orbits yet discov- ered, at a dis- tance a stag- gering 100 times greater than the distance of Jupiter from the Sun. This large distance from the cen- tral pair of stars could be key to the planet’s survival. These results were made possible thanks to the sophisticated Spectro- Polarimetric High-contrast Ex- oplanet REsearch instrument (SPHERE) mounted on ESO’s VLT in Chile. SPHERE has successfully im- aged several planets orbiting stars other than the Sun before, including taking the first ever-image of two planets orbiting a Sun-like star. However, SPHERE was not the first instrument to image this planet. As part of their study, the team looked into archival data on the b Centauri system and discovered that the planet had actually been imaged more than 20 years ago by the ESO 3.6-m telescope, though it was not recognised as a planet at the time. With ESO’s Extremely Large Tele- scope (ELT), due to start observa- tions later this decade, and with upgrades to the VLT, astronomers may be able to unveil more about this planet’s formation and fea- tures. “It will be an intriguing task to try to figure out how it might have formed, which is a mystery at the moment,” concludes Janson. I n the background, an artist’s impression shows a close up of the planet b Cen- tauri b, which orbits a binary system with mass at least six times that of the Sun. This is the most massive and hottest planet-hosting star system found to date. The planet is ten times as massive as Jupiter and orbits the two- star system at 100 times the distance Jupiter orbits the Sun. [ESO/L. Calçada] On the right, ESO’s Very Large Tele- scope has captured an image of a planet orbiting b Centauri, a pair of stars that can be seen with the naked eye. Find out why this next-door planetary system is extreme in this short video. [ESO] !