Kepler-88 is a

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 ...

-like star 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 ...

Lyra Lyra (; Latin for lyre, from Greek ''λύρα'') is a small constellation. It is one of the 48 listed by the 2nd century astronomer Ptolemy, and is one of the modern 88 constellations recognized by the International Astronomical Union. Lyra was ...

, with three confirmed

planets A planet is a large, rounded astronomical body that is neither a star nor its remnant. The best available theory of planet formation is the nebular hypothesis, which posits that an interstellar cloud collapses out of a nebula to create a young ...

. In April 2012, scientists discovered that a

Kepler Johannes Kepler (; ; 27 December 1571 – 15 November 1630) was a German astronomer, mathematician, astrologer, natural philosopher and writer on music. He is a key figure in the 17th-century Scientific Revolution, best known for his laws o ...

candidate known as KOI-142.01 (Kepler-88b) exhibited very significant

transit-timing variation Transit-timing variation is a method for detecting exoplanets by observing variations in the timing of a transit. This provides an extremely sensitive method capable of detecting additional planets in the system with masses potentially as small a ...

s caused by a non-transiting planet. Timing variations were large enough to cause changes to transit durations to Kepler-88b as well. Large transit-timing variations helped to put tight constraints to masses of both planets. The non-transiting planet was further confirmed through the

radial velocity method Doppler spectroscopy (also known as the radial-velocity method, or colloquially, the wobble method) is an indirect method for finding extrasolar planets and brown dwarfs from radial-velocity measurements via observation of Doppler shifts in t ...

in November 2013.

Planetary system

Kepler-88b is the innermost planet in the system and is

Neptune Neptune is the eighth planet from the Sun and the farthest known planet in the Solar System. It is the fourth-largest planet in the Solar System by diameter, the third-most-massive planet, and the densest giant planet. It is 17 times ...

-sized but almost half as dense. Kepler 88c is about 60% as massive as

Jupiter Jupiter is the fifth planet from the Sun and the List of Solar System objects by size, largest in the Solar System. It is a gas giant with a mass more than two and a half times that of all the other planets in the Solar System combined, but ...

, but its radius is not known due to not transiting the planet. Kepler-88d orbits its star every four years, and its orbit is not circular, but elliptical. At three times the mass of Jupiter, it is the most massive. It was discovered based on six years of radial velocity (RV) follow-up from the W. M. Keck Observatory High Resolution Echelle Spectrometer spectrograph.

References

{{2012 in space Planetary systems with three confirmed planets

142 142 may refer to: * 142 (number), an integer * AD 142 Year 142 ( CXLII) was a common year starting on Sunday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known in the Roman Empire as the Year of the Consul ...

Lyra (constellation) J19243554+4040098 Planetary transit variables G-type subgiants