A HOT JUPITER ORBITING THE 1.7 M⊙ SUBGIANT HD 102956

We report the detection of a giant planet in a 6.4950 day orbit around the 1.68 M-circle dot subgiant HD 102956. The planet has a semimajor axis a = 0.081 AU and a minimum mass M-P sin i = 0.96 M-Jup. HD 102956 is the most massive star known to harbor a hot Jupiter, and its planet is only the third known to orbit within 0.6 AU of a star more massive than 1.5 M-circle dot. Based on our sample of 137 subgiants with M-* > 1.45 M-circle dot, we find that 0.5%-2.3% of Lambda-type stars harbor a close-in planet (a < 0.1 AU) with M-P sin i > 1 MJup, consistent with hot-Jupiter occurrence for Sun-like stars. Thus, the paucity of planets with 0.1 AU < a < 1.0 AU around intermediate-mass stars may be an exaggerated version of the period valley that is characteristic of planets around Sun-like stars.