HAT-P-6 and Its Jupiter-Like Planet

HAT-P-6 is a star 898 light-years away with a mass of 1.29 solar masses and a radius of 1.46 solar radii, both larger than the Sun's. Its temperature of 6570 K is hotter than the Sun's, and it is 2.3 billion years old. One planet orbits this host.

That planet, HAT-P-6 b, is a Jupiter-like world discovered in 2007 by the transit method, in which a planet passes in front of its star from our viewpoint and causes a small dip in observed brightness; repeated dips help establish orbital periods. It completes an orbit every 3.85 days and has a mass of 420 Earth masses, roughly 1.32 times Jupiter's mass, and a radius of 16.6 Earth radii, larger than Earth's. Its mean density is 0.506 g/cm³, 0.0919 times Earth's.