The "Exiled Exoplanet" HD 106906b

The 11 Jupiter mass planet HD 106906b was previously imaged a large distance from its host star. The projected separation is 650 AU, invoking speculation that it formed far from the star rather than within a disk surrounding the star. In this work we imaged the structure of the circumstellar disk using GPI and HST, discovering that it is highly asymmetric. This discovery suggested that the entire system is in a state of dynamical upheaval, lending credance to the hypothesis that the planet formed close to the star and was subsequently "exiled" to large distances. In addition, we present three lines of evidence that the planet itself may have its own circumplanetary dust.

Please click here to browse through the press release text and photographs. The results are published in the Astrophysical Journal (pdf).