Here There Be Tygers

The Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics has completed the first map of an extra-solar planet. The planet is a gas giant, only slightly larger than Jupiter, orbiting a star in the constellation Vulpecula about 60 light-years away. The planet contains one curious feature--an enormous "hot spot" (1700 degrees F) twice the size of Jupiter's Great Red Spot. Maps and animation of the planet's orbit can be found here.

Heather Knutson, one of the graduate students conducting research on the planet, remarked, "We felt a little like Galileo must have felt when he first glimpsed Jupiter through the eyepiece of his telescope." Indeed. As with Voyager, maybe in 500 years we'll be able to send back some close-ups.

Apropos of my heading, here is a Russian animated version of Bradbury's classic story.