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Rare exoplanet 48 EP

K2-66 b

RA 331.5267° · Dec -10.7115° · exoplanet

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Score breakdown

· 6 badges
48 pts · Rare
Rare 50 pts → Epic
  • Lava world +14
  • Tidally locked +10
  • Orbits a Sun-like star +8
  • Distant (over 1,000 light-years) +6
  • Confirmed exoplanet +5
  • Sub-Neptune +5
Total score 48

2 more points to reach Epic.

Badges

  • Confirmed exoplanet · +5
  • Distant (over 1,000 light-years) · +6
  • Sub-Neptune · +5
  • Lava world · +14
  • Tidally locked · +10
  • Orbits a Sun-like star · +8

Trivia

What makes it special

  • Lava world. Its surface is almost certainly an ocean of molten rock, kept liquid by the star it hugs.

What it actually is

  • Hugging its star. It orbits closer to its star than Mercury does to the Sun, completing a lap in less time than Mercury takes.
  • What it is made of. Denser than Earth — a solid world of rock and iron, with no meaningful atmosphere to speak of by mass.

Sense of scale

  • In perspective. Far away by human standards, yet still a local address inside the Milky Way's spiral arms.

Find it in the sky

  • How to spot it. At magnitude 11.7 you'll want a small backyard telescope.
  • Southern sky. It rides the southern half of the sky — an easier target the further south you are.
  • Best time of year. It stands highest in the middle of the night around August — that's when to go looking.

Could we get there?

  • Verdict. Impossible with our current technology — and the next millennium of it.

Properties

density gcc
7.8
diameter km
31762.938
discovery facility
K2
discovery method
Transit
discovery year
2016
dist ly
1676.0407
eccentricity
0
eq temp k
1372
host star teff
5887
inclination
86.6
insolation
840
mag
11.71
mass earth
21.3
name
K2-66 b
orbital period days
5.0696
radius earth
2.49
semi major au
0.0598
sys num planets
1
sys num stars
1
tidally locked
yes
tidally locked inferred
yes

About K2-66 b

K2-66 b is a rare exoplanet. It lies about 1,676 light-years from Earth, shines at apparent magnitude 11.71, has an equilibrium temperature near 1,372 K and spans roughly 2.49 Earth radii.

Its surface is almost certainly an ocean of molten rock, kept liquid by the star it hugs.

How to see it

At apparent magnitude 11.71, a small backyard telescope will bring it into view.

Like any astronomical target, K2-66 b is best seen from a dark site away from city lights, and when it is above the horizon depends on your latitude and the time of year. The visibility panel above works out tonight's viewing window for your saved location.

Why K2-66 b is a rare exoplanet

K2-66 b scores 48 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the rare tier. Another 2 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 6 science badges — Confirmed exoplanet, Distant (over 1,000 light-years), Sub-Neptune, Lava world, Tidally locked and Orbits a Sun-like star — each earned for a real, measurable property of the object. Rarity on Spacedle is never random: the more remarkable an object's astrophysics, the more badges it collects, the higher it scores, and the rarer it ranks.