Weird Alien Planets Stuck in Backwards Orbits Explained
Clara Moskowitz, SPACE.com senior writer
Date: 11 May 2011 Time: 01:00 PM ET
Some hot Jupiter alien planets orbit in a direction opposite to the stellar rotation. This can be caused by gravitational perturbations of another hot Jupiter in the system (shown in upper left).
CREDIT: Lynette Cook
Scientists have a new explanation for the mystery of why some alien planets the size of Jupiter or larger travel in the opposite direction of their parent star's spin.
Of the more than 500 alien planets that have so far been discovered, many have turned out to be oddballs. Scientists have found planets with extremely elongated or highly tilted orbits, or planets that follow paths that swing in very close to their parent stars.
The cream of the weird planet crop are so-called hot Jupiters— large gas giant planets that circle extremely close to their stars — that seem to orbit around their stars in the opposite direction of their parent star's spin. About a quarter of all hot Jupiter planets discovered by astronomers seem to be these strange backward-traveling worlds.
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