space telescope observing James Webb For the first time there is Carbon Dioxide In the atmosphere of an exoplanet, that is, a planet outside the solar system that includes the Earth, a discovery that shows its enormous capabilities and excites scientists to follow up on the additional data that it will provide in this regard.
Although the discovered planet is a hot and gaseous giant on which it is impossible for life as we know it, this discovery shows the possibility of conducting observations of rocky planets, with the ultimate aim of finding out if any of them have favorable conditions for the emergence of life forms.
Pierre-Olivier Lagag, an astrophysicist at the French Atomic Energy Authority, said in a statement to AFP on Thursday that this discovery “opens the door for future studies of super-Earths.”
As for Natalie Batalia, a professor of astrophysics at the University of California, Santa Cruz, she considered the discovery on Twitter that the discovery is amazing, and wrote: “We really have a chance to discover the atmospheres of Earth-sized planets.”
And the US space agency (NASA) explained that monitoring carbon dioxide will also allow us to learn more regarding the composition of this planet, called WASP-39 b, which was discovered in 2011. This planet is located 700 light-years away, and represents regarding a quarter of the mass of Jupiter. It is very close to the sun.
This planet was chosen because it has several criteria that facilitate its observation, while scientists are still evaluating the capabilities of the telescope, which revealed its first images less than two months ago.
The planet passes very regularly in front of its sun (it revolves around it in four days), and its atmosphere is expanding.
The James Webb Telescope provides data on the planet by capturing the tiny contrast in brightness caused by its passage in front of its star.
The telescope then performed analyzes of “filtered” light through the planet’s atmosphere, as the various molecules in the atmosphere leave specific signatures that enable their composition to be determined.
The Hubble and Spitzer telescopes had previously observed the presence of water vapor, sodium and potassium in the atmosphere of this planet, but James Webb was able to go deeper thanks to his great infrared ability.
transfer statement “NASA” Zafer Rustamkulov of Johns Hopkins University says that detecting CO2 is “crossing a threshold in exoplanet science”.
(AFP)
