Confirmed Exoplanet Discovered 2019

HD 20781 b

A rocky terrestrial orbiting the k-type orange HD 20781, located approximately 117.3 light-years from Earth.

Key parameters at a glance

  • A radius of 1.21 Earth radii
  • A mass of 1.93 Earth masses
  • Surface gravity around 1.32 g
  • An orbital period of 5.314 days
  • Semi-major axis 0.0529 AU
  • Distance from Earth 117.32 light-years
  • Earth Similarity Index 0.939
  • Travel time at Voyager 1 speed 2,068,995 years
  • Almost certainly tidally locked to its host star given the close orbit

Context from the literature

HD 20781 is a star which is part of a wide binary system with HD 20782. The companion star has a very large angular separation of 252 arcsec, corresponding to 9080 AU at the distance of HD 20782. Both stars possess their own planetary systems in S type orbits, with a total of five known planets around both stars. This is the first known example of planets being found orbiting both components of a wide binary system. HD 20781 has no noticeable starspot activity.

Excerpted from Wikipedia · full article

3 siblings around HD 20781

HD 20781 b shares its host star with 3 other confirmed planets. Side-by-side measurements below.

Planet Type Radius (R⊕) Mass (M⊕) Period (d) Eq. T (K) Year
HD 20781 b this Rocky Terrestrial 1.21 1.93 5.314 2019
HD 20781 c Sub-Neptune 2.17 5.33 13.891 2019
HD 20781 d Sub-Neptune 3.25 10.61 29.158 2019
HD 20781 e Sub-Neptune 3.83 14.03 85.507 2019

HD 20781 b Planet Profile

Physical Specs

Radius
1.21 R⊕
Radius (Jupiter)
0.108 R♃
Mass
1.93 M⊕
Mass (Jupiter)
0.006 M♃
Density
5.99 g/cm³
Surface Gravity
1.32 g (Earth)

Classification

Planet Type

Rocky Terrestrial

ESI Score 0.939
HZ Position Unknown
Controversial No

Discovery

Year 2019
Method Radial Velocity
Facility La Silla Observatory
Telescope 3.6 m ESO Telescope

Size rank in cohort

Rank by radius

#56of 570

top 9.6%

This planet

1.21R⊕

Rocky Terrestrial median

1.01R⊕

Nearest-size peers

Metric Earth HD 20781 b Jupiter
Radius (R⊕)1.001.2111.21
Mass (M⊕)1.001.93317.83
Density (g/cm³)5.515.991.33
Surface Gravity (g)1.001.322.53
Insolation (S⊕)1.000.037

Alternative Mass Estimates

Method Value Interpretation
Minimum mass (M sin i) 1.930 M⊕ Lower bound from radial-velocity fitting.

Star Catalogue Identifiers

HD

HD 20781

HIP

HIP 15526

TIC

TIC 144503312

Gaia DR2

Gaia DR2 5060105892897388288

Gaia DR3

Gaia DR3 5060105897197110144

System

HD 20782

Percentile among Rocky Terrestrial cohort

Radius 1.210 R⊕ · percentile 87 / cohort 570
Mass 1.930 M⊕ · percentile 82 / cohort 570
Orbital period 5.31 d · percentile 56 / cohort 567
Distance 35.97 pc · percentile 15 / cohort 566
ESI 0.939 · percentile 92 / cohort 570

Orbit & Habitability

Orbital Dynamics

Period
5.314 days
Semi-major axis
0.0529 AU
Eccentricity
0.100
Inclination
°

Year Length

A year here lasts approximately 5.31 Earth days (1.5% of a terrestrial year) on a mildly elliptical path at a mean orbital distance of 0.0529 AU.

Eq. Temperature

 

Insolation (S⊕)

Earth = 1.00

Earth Similarity (ESI)

0.939

0 = alien, 1 = Earth-identical

Insufficient insolation data. Close-orbiting tidally-locked around a cool host.

Discovery Paper

Primary reference

Udry et al. 2019

Instrument

HARPS Spectrograph

Publication

2019-02

Observation locale

Ground

Host System: HD 20781

Spectral Class

K-type orange

Effective Temperature

5,256 K — cooler than the Sun (5,778 K)

Estimated Age

Stellar Radius

0.834 R☉

Stellar Mass

0.700 M☉

Metallicity [Fe/H]

-0.11

Extended Stellar Properties

Surface gravity (log g)

4.370 dex

Stellar density

1.962 g/cm³

Systemic radial velocity

40.31 km/s

Rotational v·sin i

1.10 km/s

Rotation period

46.80 days

Metallicity ratio

[Fe/H]

Distance
35.97 parsec
Light-years 117.32 ly
V-band magnitude
8.48 mag
Voyager-speed travel 2,068,995 yr

Multi-band Host Photometry — 7 bands

6.69.29.24B8.48V8.24Gaia7.72TESS7.05J6.64H6.55K

Astrometric Data

Parallax

27.771 mas

Total Proper Motion

355.159 mas/yr

PM Right Ascension

348.85 mas/yr

PM Declination

-66.66 mas/yr

Galactic Cartesian (pc)

x = 0.563 · y = 0.672 · z = -0.482

Equatorial (J2000)

RA 50.01398° · Dec -28.78412°

Galactic ℓ, b

224.673° · -57.272°

Ecliptic λ, β

37.008° · -45.145°

HTM-20 index

-935964729

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