Giant exoplanet TOI 5205b defies formation rules around red dwarf
Astronomers three years earlier found a giant exoplanet called TOI 5205b orbiting a small red dwarf star, and it's kind of breaking the rules.
This gas giant is nearly a one-quarter the size of its star and blocks 7% of its light, way more than usual.
Scientists are calling it "forbidden" because planets this big aren't supposed to form around such small stars, at least according to what we thought we knew.
JWST reveals TOI 5205b metal-poor atmosphere
The James Webb Space Telescope took a closer look and found that TOI 5205b's atmosphere has fewer heavy elements than planets like Jupiter or Saturn, which hints at some unusual building blocks.
The planet might have formed in a totally unexpected way, with heavy elements moving inward as it grew.
Discovered by Carnegie astronomers, this planet is making astronomers rethink how planets form, especially around stars that don't have much material to work with.
As researcher Anjali Piette put it, There may be more massive planets around red dwarfs than we previously thought.