Although KELT North, telescope, located at the southern Arizona (USA), is very small, it managed to find two very unusual planet, one of which is a brown dwarf, very close to its star, and the second - for the first time in the history of astronomy - can provide scientists with the opportunity to analyze the chemical composition of atmospheres of exoplanets.
Made New Horizons images of Jupiter on the background of the Sun allowed to obtain a detailed understanding of its atmosphere. The same may be able to KELT-2Ab. (Photo by NASA / Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory / Southwest Research Institute.)

KELT stands for "Tysyacheletiy very small telescope" (Kilodegree Extremely Little Telescope). It was designed by the Vanderbilt University "in spite" normal telescopes, watching small areas of the starry sky at high resolution. Resolution KELT, on the contrary, very little; he can follow the planets by the method of transit photometry only very bright stars. This KELT "sees" a lot of stars, because of the low resolution covers a much greater part of the sky. And is it worth it for mere trifles - only $75 thousand

Discovered planet KELT-2Ab 30% larger than Jupiter and 50% heavier. It is in a binary system HD 42176, big sun which is slightly larger than ours, and the star is smaller in size slightly inferior to our luminary. KELT-2Ab revolves around the first star, so bright, that the Land can be seen in the strong binoculars. This brightness, according to scientists, gives a unique chance of direct spectral analysis of the composition of the atmosphere exoplanets: against the background of the stars we want to believe, for the first time will be able to directly study the chemical composition ekzoplanetoy atmosphere that will undoubtedly seriously promote science in understanding typical distribution of chemical elements in insolveny systems.

Of course, for such a study would require the involvement of more powerful telescopes, including space-based.

The second planet, KELT-1b is much more exotic celestial body. It revolves around the sun, similar to ours, but very close to it, so the year is a bit more of our days (or more precisely, 30 earthly hours). According to estimates, there shone should occupy a quarter of the visible sky, although to look at this is truly a killer spectacle, of course, no one. This brown dwarf is only slightly larger than Jupiter, but weighs 27 times more; its density is close to the density of the OS and almost twice more, than lead. Surface temperature KELT-1b is 2 200 C.

Because of the close neighbourhood with the sun dwarf swollen much stronger than normal body type. What is particularly interesting, the calculations show that it could not be formed in such proximity to the stars, and approach it this far KELT-1b could only in the event of a collision with another comparable body mass, which, most likely, was cast out of the planetary system.

Scientists for the first time faced with a situation where such a massive planet is in stable orbit around situated in the immediate vicinity of the star. According to them, billions of years before increasing in volume local sun will absorb KELT-1b...

Based on the materials of Vanderbilt University.