Taking Up Space
The universe is full of fascinating and unique celestial bodies, from planets to moons to suns. But some planets blow scientists away with their sheer size. With that in mind, here are 5 of the biggest planets discovered so far.
1. ROXs 42 Bb
ROXs 42 Bb is a young gas giant about 460 light-years away in the Rho Ophiuchi star-forming region. It is several times the size of Jupiter and orbits a young binary star system. The planet is still very young, so it is used to understand how giant planets form and evolve.
2. 2MASS J08230313-4912012 b
One of the largest and most massive known exoplanets, it orbits very close to its star. It's almost as large as a brown dwarf, an object that is in between a planet and a small star. Its enormous size and temperature make it an important object to study the boundary between planets and stars.
3. Kepler-155c
An exoplanet that was discovered by NASA's Kepler Space Telescope. It orbits its host star quickly and is larger than Earth but smaller than Neptune. Astronomers are studying the planet in order to learn more about planets in this size range, which are the most common in the galaxy.
4. TOI-561 b
TOI-561 b is an ultra-hot rocky planet that orbits one of the oldest stars in the galaxy. It is about 50% larger than Earth and completes an orbit in less than 12 hours! It is thought to be molten all the way through because of its closeness to the star.
5. Kepler-174d
Kepler-174d is a large and rocky planet orbiting within the habitable zone of its star. The habitable zone, often referred to as the "Goldilocks Zone," is the area around a star where it is not too hot and not too cold for liquid water to possibly exist on a planet's surface. Due to its location in the habitable zone, it is considered a candidate for further studies into the potential for habitability.
