NASA (Exoplanet Catalog artwork)WASP-69b
A hot Saturn with a helium tail over half a million kilometres long
Overview
WASP-69 b is a gas giant exoplanet that orbits a K-type star. Its mass is 0.26 Jupiters, it takes 3.9 days to complete one orbit of its star, and is 0.0453 AU from its star. Its discovery was announced in 2014.
Source: NASA Exoplanet Catalog
Why it matters
- Keck observations in 2024 traced an escaping helium tail stretching about 7 planetary radii.
- Loses roughly an Earth mass of gas every billion years.
- A nearby laboratory for how stars erode planetary atmospheres.
NASA puts it this way: “WASP-69 b is a gas giant exoplanet that orbits a K-type star. Its mass is 0.29 Jupiters, it takes 3.9 days to complete one orbit of its star, and is 0.04525 AU from its star. Its discovery was announced in 2014.”
Discovery & system
- Discovered
- 2014 · Transit · SuperWASP
- Discovery paper
- Anderson et al. 2014
- Host star
- WASP-69 · K · 4,792 K · 0.83 M☉
- System
- 1 known planet
The system
| World | Period | Distance | Radius | Mass | Temp. |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| WASP-69 b | 3.87 d | 0.045 AU | 1 R♃ | 82.58 M⊕ | 971 K |
this worldhabitable zone 0.546 AU – 0.959 AUlog distance scaleorbital phases are arbitrarystar: K, 4,792 K
By the numbers
- Radius
- 1 R♃11.2 R⊕
- Mass
- 82.58 M⊕493.18 ×10²⁴ kg
- Orbital period
- 3.87 d0.01 yr
- Distance from star
- 0.045 AU6.78 million km
- Eccentricity
- 0nearly circular
- Equilibrium temp.
- 971 K698 °C
- Starlight received
- 181 × Earth
- Distance from Earth
- 163 ly50 pc
- Density
- 0.29 g/cm³0.05 × Earth
Sources
Image: NASA (Exoplanet Catalog artwork) · NASA media: generally free of copyright · image page
Text: NASA Exoplanet Catalog. Taglines and highlights are editorial.