The Closest Known Flyby of a Star to the Solar System

Passing stars can perturb the Oort Cloud, triggering comet showers and potentially extinction events on Earth. We combine velocity measurements for the recently discovered, nearby, low-mass binary system WISE J072003.20-084651.2 ("Scholz's star") to calculate its past trajectory. Integrating the Galactic orbits of this ~0.15 M_⊙ binary system and the Sun, we find that the binary passed within only 52^(+23)_(−14) kAU (0.25^(+0.11)_(−0.07) pc) of the Sun 70^(+15)_(−10) kya (1σ uncertainties), i.e., within the outer Oort Cloud. This is the closest known encounter of a star to our solar system with a well-constrained distance and velocity. Previous work suggests that flybys within 0.25 pc occur infrequently (~0.1 Myr^(−1)). We show that given the low mass and high velocity of the binary system, the encounter was dynamically weak. Using the best available astrometry, our simulations suggest that the probability that the star penetrated the outer Oort Cloud is ~98%, but the probability of penetrating the dynamically active inner Oort Cloud (<20 kAU) is ~10^(−4). While the flyby of this system likely caused negligible impact on the flux of long-period comets, the recent discovery of this binary highlights that dynamically important Oort Cloud perturbers may be lurking among nearby stars

TOI-824 b: A New Planet on the Lower Edge of the Hot Neptune Desert

We report the detection of a transiting hot Neptune exoplanet orbiting TOI-824 (SCR J1448-5735), a nearby (d = 64 pc) K4V star, using data from the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite. The newly discovered planet has a radius R p = 2.93 ± 0.20 ${R}_{\oplus }$ and an orbital period of 1.393 days. Radial velocity measurements using the Planet Finder Spectrograph and the High Accuracy Radial velocity Planet Searcher spectrograph confirm the existence of the planet, and we estimate its mass to be 18.47 ± 1.84 ${M}_{\oplus }$. The planet's mean density is ${\rho }_{{\rm{p}}}$ = 4.03${}_{-0.78}^{+0.98}$ ${\rm{g}}\,{\mathrm{cm}}^{-3}$, making it more than twice as dense as Neptune. TOI-824 b's high equilibrium temperature makes the planet likely to have a cloud-free atmosphere, and thus it is an excellent candidate for follow-up atmospheric studies. The detectability of TOI-824 b's atmosphere from both ground and space is promising and could lead to the detailed characterization of the most irradiated small planet at the edge of the hot Neptune desert that has retained its atmosphere to date

TOI-824 b: A New Planet on the Lower Edge of the Hot Neptune Desert

We report the detection of a transiting hot Neptune exoplanet orbiting TOI-824 (SCR J1448-5735), a nearby (d = 64 pc) K4V star, using data from the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite. The newly discovered planet has a radius R p = 2.93 ± 0.20 R⊕ and an orbital period of 1.393 days. Radial velocity measurements using the Planet Finder Spectrograph and the High Accuracy Radial velocity Planet Searcher spectrograph confirm the existence of the planet, and we estimate its mass to be 18.47 ± 1.84 M⊕. The planet's mean density is ρp = 4.03-0.78+0.98 g cm-3, making it more than twice as dense as Neptune. TOI-824 b's high equilibrium temperature makes the planet likely to have a cloud-free atmosphere, and thus it is an excellent candidate for follow-up atmospheric studies. The detectability of TOI-824 b's atmosphere from both ground and space is promising and could lead to the detailed characterization of the most irradiated small planet at the edge of the hot Neptune desert that has retained its atmosphere to date