Scientists at the Smithsonian have discovered a giant planet with three suns and which is 685 light years from us.
They said that while one of its Sun is about 40 times more intense than our Sun. It was also believed by the scientists that the KELT-4 system, which is home to a “Hot Jupiter” planet known as KELT-4Ab, is a binary system. However, it was recently discovered that it is instead a binary pair. This finding was possible by the use of two telescopes located in Arizona and South Africa. These two telescopes when combined together are known as Kilodegree Extremely Little Telescope (KELT).
The other two stars, KELT-4B and KELT-4C appeared dimmer, and could be compared to the Earth’s moon.
The star KELT -4A is close to us and it is brighter, making it easier to study. The other two suns are comparatively far away, dimmer and not that large. It takes KELT-4Ab just three days to orbit KELT-4A.The temperature on Hot Jupiter is very high, touching around thousands of degrees Fahrenheit.
KELT-4Ab is the fourth exoplanet, which has been discovered to have three suns. This giant planet is much closer to earth compared to other three planets therefore, it is much more convenient to observe it closely.
Jason Eastman and his colleagues at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, plan to further study these stars, and they aim to find out how their gravity pushed KELT-4Ab into such a hot spot.