HILO » Dutch astronomers using a British telescope on Mauna Kea have learned that an unusual Jupiter-like planet 800 light-years from Earth loops around its star in just 31 hours while roasting with a temperature over 3,100 degrees Fahrenheit.

Astronomers call planet TrEs-3b a “;hot Jupiter.”; Both are big and gassy. But while our solar system's Jupiter is far from the sun and cold, TrEs-3b is extremely close to its star and as hot as some stars.

TrEs-3b is 1.3 times the size of Jupiter, and much closer to its star than our solar system's closest planet to the sun, Mercury.

Discovery of TrEs-3b took place in 2007, but details did not emerge until Dutch astronomers led by Ernst de Mooij gathered data using the United Kingdom Infrared Telescope on Mauna Kea and the British-Dutch William Herschel Telescope in Spain's Canary Islands.

It was the first time light from such a planet was measured by a telescope on earth, said the Joint Astronomy Centre in Hilo, which provides support for the British telescope.

Measurements included the decrease in total amount of light from the star and planet when the planet went behind its star.

The British telescope made the measurements using “;near infrared”; light, just outside the range of human vision. Such light gives detailed information about the planet, said Andy Adamson, head of the Joint Astronomy Centre.

Space telescopes have made similar measurements of other “;hot Jupiters”; before, but those instruments use “;far infrared”; light, closer to microwaves than to visible light, which provides much less information, Adamson said.