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Uncommon exoplanet 28 EP

KOI-4978 b

RA 286.5908° · Dec 38.5583° · exoplanet

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Score breakdown

· 4 badges
28 pts · Uncommon
Uncommon 34 pts → Rare
  • Ultra-short period +14
  • Distant (over 1,000 light-years) +6
  • Confirmed exoplanet +5
  • Found by Kepler +3
Total score 28

6 more points to reach Rare.

Badges

  • Confirmed exoplanet · +5
  • Distant (over 1,000 light-years) · +6
  • Ultra-short period · +14
  • Found by Kepler · +3

Trivia

Hard to believe

  • A year in a day. Its entire year is over in 22.6 hours. Birthdays here would come round faster than meals.

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. Its density says rock, though lighter than Earth's mix: probably less iron, or a thick shell of water and ice over the top.

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 15.6 it is far too faint for the eye: this one belongs to cameras and long exposures.
  • Northern sky. It rides the northern half of the sky — an easier target the further north you are.
  • Best time of year. It stands highest in the middle of the night around July — 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
4.34
diameter km
8929.34
discovery facility
Kepler
discovery method
Transit
discovery year
2024
dist ly
3053.9324
host star teff
5050.28
mag
15.633
mass earth
0.271
name
KOI-4978 b
orbital period days
0.942
radius earth
0.7
spect
G
sys num planets
1
sys num stars
1

About KOI-4978 b

KOI-4978 b is an uncommon exoplanet. It lies about 3,053.9 light-years from Earth, shines at apparent magnitude 15.63, has spectral type G and spans roughly 0.7 Earth radii.

It orbits closer to its star than Mercury does to the Sun, completing a lap in less time than Mercury takes.

How to see it

At apparent magnitude 15.63, it takes a larger telescope or a long-exposure image to capture.

Like any astronomical target, KOI-4978 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 KOI-4978 b is an uncommon exoplanet

KOI-4978 b scores 28 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the uncommon tier. Another 6 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 4 science badges — Confirmed exoplanet, Distant (over 1,000 light-years), Ultra-short period and Found by Kepler — 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.