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Epic exoplanet 61 EP

K2-36 b

RA 169.4490° · Dec 3.8665° · exoplanet

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Score breakdown

· 6 badges
61 pts · Epic
Epic 78 pts → Anomaly
  • Denser than iron +18
  • Lava world +14
  • Tidally locked +10
  • Super-Earth +8
  • Multi-planet system +6
  • Confirmed exoplanet +5
Total score 61

17 more points to reach Anomaly.

Badges

  • Confirmed exoplanet · +5
  • Super-Earth · +8
  • Lava world · +14
  • Tidally locked · +10
  • Denser than iron · +18
  • Multi-planet system · +6

Trivia

What makes it special

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

Hard to believe

  • Denser than iron. It is packed tighter than solid iron — whatever it is made of, it is not ordinary rock.

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.
  • Crowded system. One of at least 2 planets orbiting its star.

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.
  • Seen from everywhere. It sits almost on the celestial equator, so it can be seen from essentially anywhere on Earth.

Properties

density gcc
8
diameter km
18241.366
discovery facility
K2
discovery method
Transit
discovery year
2016
dist ly
357.9529
eccentricity
0.093
eq temp k
1328
host star teff
4916
inclination
84.45
insolation
519
mag
11.726
mass earth
4.3
name
K2-36 b
orbital period days
1.4226
radius earth
1.43
semi major au
0.0229
spect
K2 V
sys num planets
2
sys num stars
1
tidally locked
yes
tidally locked inferred
yes

About K2-36 b

K2-36 b is an epic exoplanet. It lies about 358 light-years from Earth, shines at apparent magnitude 11.73, has spectral type K2 V and has an equilibrium temperature near 1,328 K.

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

How to see it

At apparent magnitude 11.73, a small backyard telescope will bring it into view.

Like any astronomical target, K2-36 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 K2-36 b is an epic exoplanet

K2-36 b scores 61 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the epic tier. Another 17 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 6 science badges — Confirmed exoplanet, Super-Earth, Lava world, Tidally locked, Denser than iron and Multi-planet system — 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.