Astronomy Picture of the Day -- TrES-2b: Dark Planet

NASA ^ | August 22, 2011 | (see photo credit)

[SunkenCiv]

Explanation: Why is this planet so dark? Planet TrES-2b reflects back less than one percent of the light it receives, making it darker than any known planet or moon, darker even than coal. Jupiter-sized TrES-2b orbits extremely close to a sun-like star 750 light years away, and was discovered producing slight eclipses in 2006 using the modest 10-cm telescopes of the Trans-Atlantic Exoplanet Survey (TrES). The alien world's strange darkness, however, was only uncovered recently by observations indicating its slight reflective glow by the Earth-orbiting Kepler satellite. An artist's drawing of planet is shown above, complete with unsubstantiated speculation on possible moons. Reasons for TrES-2b's darkness remain unknown and are an active topic of research.

[SunkenCiv]

[Illustration Credit: David A. Aguilar (CfA), TrES, Kepler, NASA]

[SunkenCiv]

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[SunkenCiv]

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[freedumb2003]

You realize that now they know we have seen them, they will be coming:

[wastedyears]

Active planet cloaking?

[struggle]

Giedi Prime

[lurk]

The planet was light and reflective, before it became a collective.

[skinkinthegrass]

Giedi Prime

[Talisker]

Hmmm... in the painting, the front “moon” actually looks like the Earth - peeks of brown land, blue oceans white clouds.

Which would make the giant red “planet”...

...not a planet.

[BIGLOOK]

We are approximately 93,000 million miles away from the Sun. I've read that if our orbit were a few million miles closer or a few million miles farther away....well, we wouldn't be here chatting about anything.

Our luxury of speculation is not necessarily unique in the universe but it is special for the time being.

Good pic of a Crispy Critter before it's gone.

[DuncanWaring]

Ya got three extra “zeros” there.

[TheOldLady]

Needs a lot more study. Why do we have an artist’s rendition instead of a false-color image from the available data?

Thanks for this and all your hard work keeping us informed, Civilizations.

[cripplecreek]

[left that other site]

That is a VERY cool pic!

[ixtl]

Actually, the reason it is so dark is that they are trying to hide from US.

[LonePalm]

Giedi Life ;-)

Just thought I'd spice up the thread.

Garde la Foi, mes amis! Nous nous sommes les sauveurs de la République! Maintenant et Toujours!
(Keep the Faith, my friends! We are the saviors of the Republic! Now and Forever!)
LonePalm, le Républicain du verre cassé (The Broken Glass Republican)

[pappyone]

Read “Boarder in Black” by Larry Niven, explains everthing.

[BIGLOOK]

Oops!

[bigheadfred]

Speaking of false color images...

We have a zero in the White Hut that we neither need, nor belongs there.

[SunkenCiv]

93 million — 93,000 million would be 93 billion. :’)

Earth’s unique — just like every other planet.