Marking yet another breakthrough from Ahmedabad, a team of scientists from the city's Physical Research Laboratory (PRL) has made a remarkable discovery, a massive exoplanet located outside our solar system. This newly identified planet, named TOI-6038A b, is significantly larger than Earth but smaller than Saturn, so enormous that it could fit 263 Earths within it!

According to scientists, TOI-6038A b falls into the rare category of sub-Saturn planets, a classification absent from our own solar system. The exoplanet boasts a mass approximately 78.5 times that of Earth and has a radius 6.41 times larger. Researchers believe that studying this planet could offer valuable insights into planetary formation and evolution.

The breakthrough was made using the state-of-the-art PARAS-2 spectrograph, an advanced instrument attached to the 2.5-meter telescope at PRL’s Mount Abu Observatory. According to the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), this marks the second exoplanet discovery using the PARAS-2 system.

When combined with previous efforts using PARAS-1, this brings the total number of exoplanets identified by PRL to five. Observing such planetary systems can help refine existing theories about planetary dynamics and movement.

The PARAS-2 spectrograph, recognized as Asia’s highest-resolution stabilized radial velocity instrument, plays a crucial role in detecting and analyzing distant exoplanets. This latest finding underscores India’s growing capabilities in space exploration and exoplanetary research.

With this discovery, astronomers hope to deepen their understanding of planetary systems beyond our own!