Astronomers have detected a third exoplanet -- a planet found outside of our solar system -- in the Kepler-88 system more than 1,200 light-years away from us, and this one dwarfs anything in our solar system
This exoplanet -- a planet found outside of our solar system -- orbits the star Kepler-88 and is known as Kepler-88 d. It takes the exoplanet four Earth years to complete an elliptical, or oval-shaped, orbit around the star.In our solar system, Jupiter is the largest planet by far and its orbit and movements affect the other planets. It's 300 times the mass of Earth and twice the mass of Saturn.
They were able to observe this using NASA's Kepler space telescope when it was in operation between 2009 and 2018.This system has some of the largest timing variations, where transits, or detectable dips in brightness when the planet passes in front of its star, would appear half a day early or half a day late.The detection of Kepler-88 d provides a new dynamic to the system, since it's such a large planet and dominates the other two.
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