HD 65216 b is an 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...

 located approximately 116 light-year

Light-year

A light-year, also light year or lightyear is a unit of length, equal to just under 10 trillion kilometres...

s 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 Carina

Carina (constellation)

Carina is a constellation in the southern sky. Its name is Latin for the keel of a ship, and it was formerly part of the larger constellation of Argo Navis until that constellation was divided in three.-Stars:...

, orbiting the star HD 65216

HD 65216

HD 65216 is an 8th magnitude G-type main sequence star located approximately away in the constellation of Carina. It is a Sun-like yellow dwarf, 8% less massive and somewhat less luminous. It cannot be seen without technical aid, but with binoculars or telescope it should be visible.- Planetary...

. This planet

Planet

A planet is a celestial body orbiting a star or stellar remnant that is massive enough to be rounded by its own gravity, is not massive enough to cause thermonuclear fusion, and has cleared its neighbouring region of planetesimals.The term planet is ancient, with ties to history, science,...

 was discovered by the Geneva Extrasolar Planet Search Team in 2003. Like most planet candidates so far, it was detected with the radial velocity

Radial velocity

Radial velocity is the velocity of an object in the direction of the line of sight . In astronomy, radial velocity most commonly refers to the spectroscopic radial velocity...

 method.

The planet has a minimum mass

Minimum mass

In astronomy, minimum mass is the lower-bound calculated mass of observed objects such as planets, stars and binary systems, nebulae, and black holes. Minimum mass is a widely cited statistic for extrasolar planets...

 about 20% more than 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,...

. Since the discovery method gives only the minimum mass, its true mass

True mass

The term true mass is synonymous with the term mass, but is used in astronomy to differentiate the measured mass of a planet from the lower limit of mass usually obtained from radial velocity techniques...

 is probably slightly greater. The planet orbits the star in a very eccentric orbit. The mean distance from the star is slightly less than that of Mars

Mars

Mars is the fourth planet from the Sun in the Solar System. The planet is named after the Roman god of war, Mars. It is often described as the "Red Planet", as the iron oxide prevalent on its surface gives it a reddish appearance...

 from the Sun, but at periastron the planet is a fifth closer to the star than Earth

Earth

Earth is the third planet from the Sun, and the densest and fifth-largest of the eight planets in the Solar System. It is also the largest of the Solar System's four terrestrial planets...

 from the Sun and at apoastron it is over twice as far.