Kepler-34 is an

eclipsing binary star A binary star is a system of two stars that are gravitationally bound to and in orbit around each other. Binary stars in the night sky that are seen as a single object to the naked eye are often resolved using a telescope as separate stars, in wh ...

system in the

constellation A constellation is an area on the celestial sphere in which a group of visible stars forms Asterism (astronomy), a perceived pattern or outline, typically representing an animal, mythological subject, or inanimate object. The origins of the e ...

of Cygnus. Both stars have roughly the same mass as the

Sun The Sun is the star at the center of the Solar System. It is a nearly perfect ball of hot plasma, heated to incandescence by nuclear fusion reactions in its core. The Sun radiates this energy mainly as light, ultraviolet, and infrared radi ...

and, like the Sun, both are spectral class G. They are separated by 0.22 AU, and complete an eccentric (e=0.5) orbit around a common center of mass every 27 days.

Planetary system

Kepler-34b is a

gas giant A gas giant is a giant planet composed mainly of hydrogen and helium. Gas giants are also called failed stars because they contain the same basic elements as a star. Jupiter and Saturn are the gas giants of the Solar System. The term "gas giant" ...

that orbits the two stars in the Kepler-34 system. The planet is just over a fifth of Jupiter's mass and has a radius of 0.764 Jupiter radii. The planet completes a somewhat eccentric orbit every 288.822 days from a semimajor axis of just over 1 AU, the largest of any transiting planets at the time of its discovery. Such detection was possible as the planet transits both the stars, thus requiring fewer orbits to confirm the planet. The majority of circumbinary planets were formed much further away from binary stars. In case of Kepler-34,

Kepler-34b Kepler-34b (formally Kepler-34(AB)b) is a circumbinary planet announced with Kepler-35b. It is a small gas giant A gas giant is a giant planet composed mainly of hydrogen and helium. Gas giants are also called failed stars because they contain ...

has likely the migrated to their current locations due interaction with the massive debris disk. From the physical growth rate of planets and account data on collisions, it is found that Kelper-34b would have grown where we find it now. Numerical simulation of formation of planetary system Kepler-34 has shown the formation of additional rocky planets in and near the habitable zone is unlikely.

References

{{Sky, 19, 45, 44.6, +, 44, 38, 29.6 Eclipsing binaries Cygnus (constellation) Planetary transit variables 2459 G-type main-sequence stars Planetary systems with one confirmed planet