I always thought WASP stood for "World Aquanaut Security Patrol"

"All are gas giants, roughly the size of Jupiter" ... "the surface temperatures are likely to be approaching 2,000°C". Hotter than Paris, alright.

So we're talking about hydrostatically stable (gas) plasmoids with an orbital period of "a matter of days" (wow, neat pun Lucy). Shurley shomething wrong shomewhere. Eye-watering facts, yet the "boffins" haven't blinked...?

Either our New Insect Overlords are over there and holding it all together with technology we can't understand, or they're over here and subverting explanations we can understand and aren't being let onto. Or both. I think we should be told, as we're paying.

Jupiter's escape velocity - 60 km / s

Typical kinetic energy of a gas molecule - 3/2 k T

Temperature at which hydrogen molecules typically have speeds equal to escape velocity of Jupiter - about 30,000 deg C.

Lose a factor of a few because you might only be worried about the peak of the distribution of molecule speeds and you're still way over 2,000 deg C.

Yours truly,

Boffins

What makes you so certain the kinetic theory of gases is (a) valid here, (b) the explanation? I think we should be told, etc