SPP 1992/Patricia Klein
–
SPACE – Desires elsewhere? GJ 367b would perhaps be the most exotic, but also the most hostile.
A team of scientists announced this Thursday, December 2 in the journal Science to have discovered this planet, the smallest and richest in iron to our knowledge beyond the solar system.
If it is only 30% smaller than Earth, GJ 367b is much denser. It is also much closer to its Sun, extremely closer even. While it takes a year to make a full circle around our star, this planet is spinning at breakneck speed and only needs eight hours to do the same.
The major drawback of this proximity is that the temperature is around 1,500 ° C during the day. Almost enough to start melting the iron that mostly composes it. Without counting on the harmful effects of solar radiations which are 500 times more powerful than with us.
“Obviously, it would not be very pleasant to live,” laughs Kristine Lam, one of the astronomers from the German Center for Aeronautics and Astronautics in Berlin who took part in the discovery. However, it would be possible that the planet has an atmosphere rich in minerals if its surface becomes muddy and they evaporate. An environment that she and the rest of the team hope to be able to analyze in more detail, especially with the James Webb Space Telescope that NASA has planned to take off on December 22.
See also on The HuffPost: DART, NASA’s “Armageddon” mission to deflect an asteroid
–
