The Gemini Planet Imager (GPI) on the Gemini South telescope in Chile has given scientists and astronomers the first ever series of images of an exoplanet as it orbits a star.
Beta (β) Pictoris b, discovered in 2008, is a gas giant planet 10 to 12 times the mass of Jupiter, with an orbit roughly the diameter of Saturn's. The exoplanet is seen in the series of images orbiting the star β Pictoris, which lies over 60 light-years from Earth. The images were captured between November 2013 and April 2015 and show the exoplanet β Pictoris b as it moves through 1.5 years of its 22-year orbital period.
"The images in the series represent the most accurate measurements of the planet's position ever made. In addition, with GPI, we're able to see both the disc and the planet at the exact same time. With our combined knowledge of the disc and the planet we're really able to get a sense of the planetary system's architecture and how everything interacts," said Maxwell Millar-Blanchaer, a PhD-candidate in the Department of Astronomy & Astrophysics, University of Toronto, who is the lead author of a paper, according to Science Daily.
"It's remarkable that Gemini is not only able to directly image exoplanets but is also capable of effectively making movies of them orbiting their parent star. Beta Pictoris is a special target. The disc of gas and dust from which planets are currently forming was one of the first to be observed and is a fabulous laboratory for the study of young solar systems," said Chris Davis, astronomy division program director at the National Science Foundation, Astronomy Now reported.
"It's fortunate that we caught β Pic b just as it was heading back-as seen from our vantage point-toward β Pictoris. This means we can make more observations before it gets too close to its parent star and that will allow us to measure its orbit even more precisely," said Laurent Pueyo, who works with the Space Telescope Science Institute and is co-author of the paper, according to The Dunlap Institute at The University Of Toronto In Ontario, Canada.
Developed by an international team led by Stanford University's Prof. Bruce Macintosh and the University of California Berkeley's Prof. James Graham, GPI is a groundbreaking instrument that has broadened the horizons of science.
The paper has been published in the Astrophysical Journal.
