Fact Sheet
Planet Blaster
Hubble Space Telescope discovered carbon and oxygen in the extended atmosphere of a giant planet orbiting the star HD 209458 -- the first detection of either element in a planet outside our own solar system. As this artist's concept shows, the planet orbits quite close to its parent star. Heat and radiation strip away some of the planet's hot outer atmosphere, surrounding the planet with a thin shell of gas that extends thousands of miles into space. [Credit: ESA, Alfred Vidal-Madjar]
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