Photos: Pink Alien Planet Is Smallest Seen with Sun-Like Star

By Space.com Staff
published

Exoplanet GJ 504b

NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/S. Wiessinger

Glowing a dark magenta, the newly discovered exoplanet GJ 504b weighs in with about four times Jupiter's mass, making it the lowest-mass planet ever directly imaged around a star like the sun. [Read the Full Story]

Exoplanet GJ 504 b

M. Kuzuhara, University of Tokyo/SEEDS Survey

The Subaru Telescope captured this image of exoplanet GJ 504 b, which is several times larger than Jupiter. [Read the Full Story]

Alien Planet Revealed

NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center/NOAJ

This composite combines Subaru images of GJ 504 using two near-infrared wavelengths (shown in orange and blue). Once processed to remove scattered starlight, the images reveal the orbiting planet, GJ 504 b. [Read the Full Story]

Virgo

NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/NOAJ

The newly imaged planet orbits the fifth-magnitude star GJ 504, also known as 59 Virginis, which is visible to the unaided eye from suburban skies in the constellation Virgo. [Read the Full Story]

Near-Infrared Disks

National Astronomical Observatory of Japan

The disks in this image were photographed in the near-infrared through the Strategic Exploration of Exoplanets and Disks with Subaru, or SEEDS, program. Alien worlds detected in the gaps and spiral-arm structures of these disks could help explain how planets form in young star systems. [Read the Full Story]

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Space.com Staff
Space.com Staff
News and editorial team

Space.com is the premier source of space exploration, innovation and astronomy news, chronicling (and celebrating) humanity's ongoing expansion across the final frontier. Originally founded in 1999, Space.com is, and always has been, the passion of writers and editors who are space fans and also trained journalists. Our current news team consists of Editor-in-Chief Tariq Malik; Editor Hanneke Weitering, Senior Space Writer Mike Wall; Senior Writer Meghan Bartels; Senior Writer Chelsea Gohd, Senior Writer Tereza Pultarova and Staff Writer Alexander Cox, focusing on e-commerce. Senior Producer Steve Spaleta oversees our space videos, with Diana Whitcroft as our Social Media Editor.