Super Mercury

A Super Mercury (Eng. Translation Super Mercury ) is an Earth-like planet in a close orbit around a star, and on the planet's surface there is such a high temperature that the exoplanet no atmospheric gases can bind. An alternate name for Super Mercury is Hot Super-Earth .

Rocky planets with an orbital period of less than 50 days and a mass of less than ten Earth masses , which orbit a sun-like star in the broadest sense, are counted among the Super Mercuries. In the context of planetology, the sun-like stars include the main sequence stars with the spectral classes F, G and K, which maintain a stable phase of hydrogen burning over a period of more than a billion years and do not destroy a possible atmosphere through strong flare activity . Observations with the Kepler Space Telescope show a probability of Super Mercuries around stars similar to the Sun of around 17 percent.

Artist's impression of the dust cloud emanating from the planet KIC 12557548b

The surface of the planet can heat up in narrow orbits of a few hours to such an extent that the rock surface of the planet evaporates and a plume of dust emanates from it, as with the exoplanet KIC 12557548b.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ A.-S. Maurin et al .: Characterizing Super-Mercuries by their infrared orbital photometry . In: European Planetary Science Congress 2012 . tape 7 , 2012.
2. ↑ F. Selsis et al .: The effect of rotation and tidal heating on the thermal light curves of Super Mercuries . In: Astrophysics. Solar and Stellar Astrophysics . 2013, arxiv : 1305.3858v1 .
3. ↑ M. Brogi, CU Keller, M. de Juan Ovelar, MA Kenworthy, RJ de Kok, M. Min, IAG Snellen: Evidence for the disintegration of KIC 12557548 b . In: Astrophysics. Solar and Stellar Astrophysics . 2012, arxiv : 1208.2988v1 .