Henry Norris Russell Postdoctoral Fellow, Ashley Chontos and an international team, have detected a planet that is nearing the end of its lifetime, one that is likely to end tragically by being engulfed by its host star.  The planet, Kepler-1658b, was discovered by Chontos in 2019 when she was a graduate student at University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa.  Kepler-1658b was the first planet candidate discovered by the Kepler Mission.  The team has calculated that the planet’s orbital period is decreasing at a rate indicating its demise in less than 3 million years.

To learn more about the exoplanet and Ashley’s work, click here.