HD 50499

HD 50499 is a yellow dwarf star approximately 154 light-years away in the constellation of constellation of Puppis. It is suspected that the star is hotter, larger, and more massive than the Sun. The magnitude is 7, this star is too faint to be in naked eye visibility. As of 2005, at least one extrasolar planet has been confirmed to be orbiting the star.

Planetary system

The first planet discovered, HD 50499 b, is a gas giant with mass of 1.7 times Jupiter. It is a long period, taking 351 weeks to orbit the star. The planet’s eccentric orbit passes through the average distance of 574 Gm or 18.6 μpc.

The planet was discovered by four team members including Steve Vogt in 2005 using their radial velocity method, which used to measure changes in red- and blue-shifting of the star that indicate the presence of planets caused by gravitational tug. There is also a linear trend in the radial velocities, which may indicate an additional outer planet. The best two-planet model gives a different period and mass for the inner planet (9.8 years and 3.4 Jupiter masses), with an outer planet of 2.1 Jupiter masses in a 37-year orbit. However the two-planet model does not represent a significant improvement over the model with one planet and a linear trend, so more observations are needed to constrain the parameters of the outer planet.

See also

* HD 50554

References

* Vogt et al.; Butler, R. Paul; Marcy, Geoffrey W.; Fischer, Debra A.; Henry, Gregory W.; Laughlin, Greg; Wright, Jason T.; Johnson, John A. (2005). "Five New Multicomponent Planetary Systems". The Astrophysical Journal 632 (1): 638–658. doi:10.1086/432901. http://www.iop.org/EJ/article/0004-637X/632/1/638/62043.html.

External links

* "HD 50499". Extrasolar Visions. http://www.extrasolar.net/startour.asp?StarCatID=normal&StarID=254. Retrieved 2008-06-26.