Posted Jul 6, 2026 at 8:50 PM UTC
NASA’s planet-hunting spacecraft discovered a “super-Jupiter” with a new method.
By looking through data from NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS), researchers uncovered a planet through microlensing for the first time — a concept theorized by Einstein that picks up on planets as their gravity warps space-time.
Though the ESA’s now-retired Gaia telescope first discovered hints of the planet in 2023, TESS’s data revealed a planet that’s 1.6 times Jupiter’s mass and almost 40,000 light-years away from Earth.
An artist’s depiction of the “super Jupiter,” Gaia23bra b. Image: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center
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