Eighty-seven light-years away, a planet orbits its star in a geometry that defies the orderly story science has told about how worlds are born. Gliese 523b — denser than Earth yet more than twice its size, tilted nearly perpendicular to its star's equator — is the first confirmed mega-Earth, a category that has lived in theory for over a decade without a concrete example to anchor it. Its existence does not resolve a mystery so much as formalize one, reminding us that the universe continues to produce phenomena that outpace our frameworks for understanding them.
Astronomers Identify First Confirmed 'Mega-Earth' Exoplanet With Puzzling Polar Orbit
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