Scientists Discover “Super-Jupiter” Planet- 13 times bigger than Jupiter

November 22, 2012

Super Jupiter: Astrophysicists at the University of Toronto declared that they have discovered a new planet which is 13 times bigger than the the largest planet in our solar system "Jupiter". Located 168 light years from Earth orbiting the star Kappa Andromedae, this planet is about 12.8 times more massive than Jupiter and an orbit somewhat larger than Neptune’s.

Kappa Andromedae: The host star around which the planet orbits has a mass 2.5 times that of the Sun, making it the highest mass star to ever host a directly observed planet.

Finding this planet also helps astronomers solve another mystery – “How big can a star get before it can’t make planets anymore?”
Kappa Andromedae is the largest star known so far to have a planet – it’s 2.5 times the size of our own Sun. Now the argument put forward by some astronomers is that if a star gets too massive, it will disrupt the planetary formation process.
On the other hand, some other astronomers counter argue that as stars get bigger, planets get proportionally bigger as well.
This discovery will probably not solve the above dispute but surely it will furnish more evidence to find an eventual solution.

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