Epic exoplanet 61 EP

GQ Lup b

RA 237.3004° · Dec -35.6515° · exoplanet

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Score breakdown

· 5 badges

61 pts · Epic

Epic 68 pts → Anomaly

Ultra-hot Jupiter +26
Directly imaged +16
Hot Jupiter +10
Confirmed exoplanet +5
Gas giant +4

Total score 61

7 more points to reach Anomaly.

Badges

Confirmed exoplanet · +5
Gas giant · +4
Hot Jupiter · +10
Ultra-hot Jupiter · +26
Directly imaged · +16

Trivia

What makes it special

Ultra-hot Jupiter. So hot that iron vaporises and rains back down as molten metal.

Could we get there?

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

Getting there

Aboard Voyager 1. ≈ 8.7 million years at Voyager 1's speed (17 km/s).
Fastest probe ever. ≈ 769.9 thousand years even at the Parker Solar Probe's 192 km/s.
At 10% light speed. ≈ 4930 years in a starship at a tenth of light speed.
Distance. 493 light-years from Earth.

Look-back time

Look-back time. The light you'd see left around the year 1533.

Saying hello

Say hello. A radio message and its reply would take 986 years round-trip.

By the numbers

Size. About 33.6× the width of Earth.
Volume. About 37.9 thousand Earths could fit inside it.
Mass. Roughly 6356× Earth's mass — about 20 Jupiters.
Your weight. You'd weigh about 5.6× your Earth weight standing here.
Density. Less dense than water — drop it in a big enough ocean and it would float.
Temperature. Around 2650 K — hot enough to vaporise iron.

How we found it

Discovery. Found by Paranal Observatory using the imaging method.

Properties

density gcc: 0.921
discovery facility: Paranal Observatory
discovery method: Imaging
dist ly: 493.0468
eq temp k: 2650
insolation: 0.0001
mass earth: 6356
name: GQ Lup b
radius earth: 33.6
sys num planets: 1

About GQ Lup b

GQ Lup b is an epic exoplanet. It lies about 493 light-years from Earth, has an equilibrium temperature near 2,650 K, spans roughly 33.6 Earth radii and weighs about 6,356 Earth masses.

So hot that iron vaporises and rains back down as molten metal.

How to see it

Like any astronomical target, GQ Lup 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 GQ Lup b is an epic exoplanet

GQ Lup b scores 61 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the epic tier. Another 7 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 5 science badges — Confirmed exoplanet, Gas giant, Hot Jupiter, Ultra-hot Jupiter and Directly imaged — 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.