The first super-Earth discovered has been emitting strange signals for nearly two decades, and scientists may finally know why.
A new study shows that volcanoes on this terrifying world periodically open up and release hot gases that form the atmosphere, which then burns and leaves the planet denuded again. Testing this theory would involve training the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) on a strange exoplanet.
Planet 55 Cancri e is a rocky world with a mass about eight times our planet, and was discovered in 2004 about 40 light years from Earth.
Related: 32 stunning images taken by the James Webb Space Telescope
The planet is so close to its parent star, less than 2% of the distance between Earth and the Sun, that it completely orbits it in just 17 hours. This creates rather extreme conditions on the planet that cannot be explained.
Perhaps the most confusing aspect of this planet, as shown in… Papers are accepted in September According to the Astrophysical Journal Letters, the nature of the transit signal is. This is the light seen from Earth when 55 Cancri e passes in front of its parent star, causing a small eclipse, and the light seen when the planet passes behind its star.
Sometimes, when 55 Cancri e passes behind its star, no visible light comes from the planet itself, while other times the planet emits a strong visible light signal. In infrared light, there is always a signal, although the strength of this signal varies.
Infrared light observations using the Spitzer Space Telescope show that the daytime side of the planet experiences scorching temperatures of more than 4,400 degrees Fahrenheit (2,427 degrees Celsius), while the nightside is cooler, but still hellish, with temperatures reaching those temperatures. about 2060 Fahrenheit. (1127c).
In the new study, the authors hypothesize that the planet’s proximity to its host star causes outgassing, meaning giant volcanoes and thermal vents open, spewing hot, carbon-rich elements into the atmosphere. However, the planet cannot maintain its atmosphere for long due to the intense heat, and this gas eventually evaporates, leaving the planet in an empty state until it begins to emit gas again.
Unlike most planets, 55 Cancri e’s atmosphere is unstable. The outgassing process attempts to increase the volume of the atmosphere, while the intense radiation and solar wind from the star blow it away. However, these two processes are not balanced, causing planets to sometimes have atmospheres and sometimes not.
Researchers believe that an imbalance in the planet’s atmosphere could explain the strange transit signal. When a planet is in an atmosphere-free “bare” phase, no visible light comes out of the planet’s atmosphere, because it doesn’t exist, but the hot surface of the planet still emits infrared light. As the atmosphere swells, visible light and all radiation originating from the surface appears in the transit signal.
Even though it’s just a hypothesis, the James Webb Space Telescope offers a way to test it. By measuring the pressure and temperature of a planet’s atmosphere, scientists can determine whether an atmosphere has always been present or not.
2023-10-19 13:28:51
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