newsletter NASA JPL 13/11/08 Hubble Directly Observes a Planet Orbiting Another Star PASADENA, Calif. -- NASA's Hubble Space Telescope has taken the first visible-light snapshot of a planet circling another star. The team of astronomers who made the discovery includes researchers at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. Estimated to be no more than three times Jupiter's mass, the planet, called Fomalhaut b, orbits the bright southern star Fomalhaut, located 25 light-years away in the constellation Piscis Australis, or the "Southern Fish." Fomalhaut has been a candidate for planet hunting ever since an excess of dust was discovered around the star in the early 1980s by NASA's Infrared Astronomy Satellite. και http://www.skyandtelescope.com/news/home/34395079.html http://www.skyandtelescope.com/letsgo/whatsuptonight/34475779.html