HD 189733b IS BLUE

[danielj]

Strange Blue World: Alien Planet's True Color Revealed, a First


by Miriam Kramer, Staff Writer

Date: 11 July 2013 Time: 08:46 AM ET










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Artist’s Impression of the Deep Blue Planet HD 189733b





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This illustration shows HD 189733b, a huge gas giant that orbits very close to its host star HD 189733. The planet's atmosphere is scorching with a temperature of over 1000 degrees Celsius, and it rains glass, sideways, in howling 7000 kilometer-per-hour winds. Image released July 11, 2013.
CREDIT: NASA, ESA, M. Kornmesser

View full size image


Call it the deep blue dot. For the first time, scientists have seen the visible color of a distant alien world. The exoplanet — called HD 189733b — is 63 light-years from Earth and a "deep cobalt blue," with raging storms of glass rain and super-fast winds, scientists say.

The alien planet's blue color was pinned down using observations from the Hubble Space Telescope. Although the planet might be the same color as Earth from space, scientists think that HD 189733b is a "hot Jupiter" — a gas giant planet that orbits very close to its star. It takes 2.2 Earth days for the planet to travel fully around its sun.


Exotic Blue Planet HD 189733b (Labelled Artist’s Impression)




This illustration shows a "hot Jupiter" planet known as HD 189733b orbiting its star, HD 189733. The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope measured the actual visible light color of the planet, which is deep blue. Image released July 11, 2013.
CREDIT: NASA, ESA, and G. Bacon (AURA/STScI)
View full size image

"This planet has been studied well in the past, both by ourselves and other teams," said Fr?d?ric Pont of the University of Exeter, U.K., leader of the Hubble observing program in a statement. "But measuring its color is a real first — we can actually imagine what this planet would look like if we were able to look at it directly."[See More Images of the Blue Alien Planet HD 189733b]






The exoplanet's weather is less than ideal. Its atmosphere is more than 1,832 degrees Fahrenheit (1,000 degrees Celsius) and the planet rains glass sideways in 4,350 mile per hour (7,000 km/h) winds, according to Hubble officials.






In 2007, NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope helped scientists map the weather conditions of the strange alien planet when the spacecraft produced one of the first temperature maps of an exoplanet. The data revealed that temperatures on the day and night sides of the world differ by about 500 degrees Fahrenheit (260 degrees Celsius), causing the strong winds to blow.

Scientists aren't sure what causes the blue planet's coloration, however.

"It's difficult to know exactly what causes the color of a planet's atmosphere, even for planets in the solar system," Pont said. "But these new observations add another piece to the puzzle over the nature and atmosphere of HD 189733b. We are slowly painting a more complete picture of this exotic planet."


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CREDIT: Space.com Store
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The research team uncovered the planet's color by measuring the light reflected off the surface of the planet.

"We saw the brightness of the whole system drop in the blue part of the spectrum when the planet passed behind its star," Tom Evans of the University of Oxford, U.K., the leader of the study being published in the Aug. 1 issue of the journal Astrophysical Journal Letters said in a statement. "From this, we can gather that the planet is blue, because the signal remained constant at the other colors we measured."

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[danielj]

Some one did a fictional texture of HD 189733b and it was rather good. But I can?t find it anymore.Should someone do a blue version?

[t00fri]

Here is the link from the NASA site

http://planetquest.jpl.nasa.gov/system/ ... 1373561226

Fridger

[danielj]

I did something like that someday, but I didn?t find the texture. I think that now we have a temperatura map and its color, would be possible to try something a little more "realistic". I did something right now, but is too crude. I used the 51 Pegasi texture as a base and use the tool dissolve.
Take a look:
http://i.imgur.com/IcELMfV.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/de2zUrI.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/wl2EGkw.jpg

[danielj]

This 51 Pegasi
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:51_Pe ... lestia.jpg

[John Van Vliet]

--- edit----

[t00fri]

My NASA link of the same object above certainly worked until quite recently, since I clicked it myself several times in the meantime and since I never post untested links . So they must have changed something...

Fridger

[danielj]

Its texture is not in Motherlode.Is it in the index of creators?
The texture with the color blue should approach HD 189733 appearance.However, judging from the NASA link,it can be improved and I don?t know how to do this.

[MiR]

danielj,

the Nasa picture is too small. But in principle you could work it out by using the polar coordinates-filter, then:

copy to a new layer, mirror, merge the two layers and make your own improvements...

Michael

[John Van Vliet]

--- edit----

[danielj]

I would like to see the larger version.

[MiR]

@danielj

really... not bad.


@John

I'm always pleasantly surprised to see how fast you are able to realise such a map.


a Smiley for you both

Michael

[MiR]

oops; - the compliment is for argelesmer, of course
lodgy - thanks for the hint.

M.