Scientists then learned that, somewhat predictably, the cotton candy planet is comprised of hydrogen and helium—which makes sense; those elements constitute similar gas giants in our neighborhood, the Milky Way galaxy.
But uniquely, WASP-193’s atmosphere is significantly more inflated than, say, Jupiter’s, stretching tens of thousands of kilometers beyond the perimeter of our own neighborly gas giant.Â
Hence, the candy planet’s incredibly low density. It’s not even an exaggeration to compare it to cotton candy—the carnival sweet usually sports a density of about .05 gram per cubic centimeter, which approximates WASP-193 b’s.Â
