Editor's Summary
14 July 2005
Too close for comfort
When extrasolar planets were first detected, many were found to be 'hot Jupiters', giant planets orbiting much closer to their host star than predicted. They are now thought to have migrated inwards from their starting points. A newly discovered hot Jupiter poses more problems for theorists. This planet is a little bigger than Jupiter and is orbiting close to the primary star of a triple-star system. But the secondary pair of stars is so close to the primary as to limit the radius of a circumstellar dust disk — raw material for planets — to just half of the present orbital radius of this hot Jupiter. And the temperature that close to a star would have been too high for giant plant formation. This one will take some explaining.
News and Views: Astronomy: Giant planet seeks nursery place
A further discovery of a planet in a binary star system — this time close in — could prove a problem for accepted theories of planetary formation. The implication is that there are more planets out there than we thought.
Artie P. Hatzes and Günther Wuchterl
doi: 10.1038/436182a
Letter: An extrasolar giant planet in a close triple-star system
Maciej Konacki
doi: 10.1038/nature03856
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