Friday, July 12, 2013

Hubble Telescope Image: Blue planet HD 189733b - Video



A planet discovered in 2005 in the constellation of Vulpecula (the Fox) was determined to be colored blue with the help of the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope.

The blue coloured planet is similar to how the Earth's color looks like from space.

The planet, HD 189733b which is a huge gas giant similar to the planet Jupiter, is 63 light years away and is closely orbiting its host star; around 1/30 the distance the Earth orbits the Sun.

Although the planet comes off with a deep cobalt blue color, its atmosphere is vastly different from that of the Earth.

The HD 189733b's atmosphere has a temperature of over 1000 degrees Celsius, and it rains glass, sideways, in howling 7000 kilometre-per-hour winds. HD 189733b is slightly bigger than the planet Jupiter.

This illustration shows HD 189733b, a huge gas giant that orbits very close to its host star HD 189733.

By observing this planet before, during, and after it disappeared behind its host star during orbit, astronomers were able to deduce that HD 189733b is a deep, azure blue — reminiscent of Earth's colour as seen from space.

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