HD 114762 b is a candidate extrasolar planet

Extrasolar planet

An extrasolar planet, or exoplanet, is a planet outside the Solar System. A total of such planets have been identified as of . It is now known that a substantial fraction of stars have planets, including perhaps half of all Sun-like stars...

, approximately 132 light years away in the constellation

Constellation

In modern astronomy, a constellation is an internationally defined area of the celestial sphere. These areas are grouped around asterisms, patterns formed by prominent stars within apparent proximity to one another on Earth's night sky....

 of Coma Berenices

Coma Berenices

Coma Berenices is a traditional asterism that has since been defined as one of the 88 modern constellations. It is located near Leo, to which it formerly belonged, and accommodates the North Galactic Pole...

, and is probably a brown dwarf

Brown dwarf

Brown dwarfs are sub-stellar objects which are too low in mass to sustain hydrogen-1 fusion reactions in their cores, which is characteristic of stars on the main sequence. Brown dwarfs have fully convective surfaces and interiors, with no chemical differentiation by depth...

. This optically undetected companion to the late F-type star HD 114762

HD 114762

HD 114762 is a binary star system approximately 132 light years away in the constellation Coma Berenices. It consists of a yellow-white main sequence star and a red dwarf companion approximately 130 AU apart. Both are low-metal subdwarfs...

 was discovered in 1989 by David Latham and others. , insufficient confirmed measurements exist to determine whether it is a high mass gas giant

Gas giant

A gas giant is a large planet that is not primarily composed of rock or other solid matter. There are four gas giants in the Solar System: Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune...

, with its lowest possible mass being 11 times the mass of Jupiter

Jupiter

Jupiter is the fifth planet from the Sun and the largest planet within the Solar System. It is a gas giant with mass one-thousandth that of the Sun but is two and a half times the mass of all the other planets in our Solar System combined. Jupiter is classified as a gas giant along with Saturn,...

, brown dwarf

Brown dwarf

Brown dwarfs are sub-stellar objects which are too low in mass to sustain hydrogen-1 fusion reactions in their cores, which is characteristic of stars on the main sequence. Brown dwarfs have fully convective surfaces and interiors, with no chemical differentiation by depth...

, or a red dwarf

Red dwarf

According to the Hertzsprung-Russell diagram, a red dwarf star is a small and relatively cool star, of the main sequence, either late K or M spectral type....

 with its highest mass around 145 times Jupiter. If it does turn out to be an exoplanet it will be the first one ever detected - although not confirmed - predating the 1992 pulsar planets found around PSR B1257+12

PSR B1257+12

PSR B1257+12, sometimes abbreviated as PSR 1257+12, is a pulsar located roughly 2000 light-years from the Sun. In 2007, it was confirmed that three extrasolar planets orbit the pulsar.- Pulsar :...

 and main-sequence yellow dwarf 51 Pegasi

51 Pegasi

51 Pegasi is a Sun-like star located 15.6 parsecs from Earth in the constellation Pegasus...

. It orbits the star around 83.89 days and an orbital eccentricity

Orbital eccentricity

The orbital eccentricity of an astronomical body is the amount by which its orbit deviates from a perfect circle, where 0 is perfectly circular, and 1.0 is a parabola, and no longer a closed orbit...

of 0.34.