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Uncommon exoplanet 25 EP

GJ 179 b

RA 73.0245° · Dec 6.4752° · exoplanet

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Score breakdown

· 4 badges
25 pts · Uncommon
Uncommon 34 pts → Rare
  • Frozen world +8
  • Orbits a red dwarf +8
  • Confirmed exoplanet +5
  • Gas giant +4
Total score 25

9 more points to reach Rare.

Badges

  • Confirmed exoplanet · +5
  • Gas giant · +4
  • Frozen world · +8
  • Orbits a red dwarf · +8

Trivia

What makes it special

  • Frozen world. A deep-frozen world, too far from its star's warmth for anything to stay liquid.

Hard to believe

  • It would float. It is less dense than water. Drop it in a big enough ocean and the whole world would bob on the surface.

What it actually is

  • What it is made of. Lighter than Neptune — a puffed-up ball of hydrogen and helium with no surface anywhere on it to stand on.

Sense of scale

  • In perspective. Inside our stellar backyard: every radio broadcast humanity has ever made has already swept past it.

Find it in the sky

  • How to spot it. At magnitude 12 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.
  • Best time of year. It stands highest in the middle of the night around December — that's when to go looking.

Could we get there?

  • Verdict. Hopelessly far for any craft humanity can build today.

Properties

density gcc
0.631
diameter km
176035.56
discovery facility
W. M. Keck Observatory
discovery method
Radial Velocity
discovery year
2009
dist ly
40.2998
eccentricity
0.21
eq temp k
64.53
host star teff
3370
inclination
61
insolation
0.0028
mag
11.963
mass earth
301.937
name
GJ 179 b
orbital period days
2288
radius earth
13.8
semi major au
2.41
spect
M3.5 V
sys num planets
1
sys num stars
1

About GJ 179 b

GJ 179 b is an uncommon exoplanet. It lies about 40.3 light-years from Earth, shines at apparent magnitude 11.96, has spectral type M3.5 V and has an equilibrium temperature near 65 K.

A deep-frozen world, too far from its star's warmth for anything to stay liquid.

How to see it

At apparent magnitude 11.96, a small backyard telescope will bring it into view.

Like any astronomical target, GJ 179 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 GJ 179 b is an uncommon exoplanet

GJ 179 b scores 25 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the uncommon tier. Another 9 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 4 science badges — Confirmed exoplanet, Gas giant, Frozen world and Orbits a red dwarf — 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.