We just heard the aurora of another world

Astronomers have picked up the first radio signal ever detected from a planet beyond our solar system — and no, it isn't aliens. The repeating bursts come from Beta Pictoris b, a giant planet 63 light-years away, and they trace a magnetic field enormously more powerful than Earth's. The signal is made by auroras — the same northern-lights glow we see at home — flashing as charged particles crash into the planet's magnetic shield. Only planets with strong fields shine like this, and a magnetic field is one of the things that keeps a planet's atmosphere — and any chance at life — from being stripped away by its star. A team led by a Harvard astronomer reported the find in a new paper: the first time we've ever 'felt' an exoplanet's protective shield without leaving home.