It could be argued that the search for habitability elsewhere in the universe can be reduced to the search for water. We have yet to find life forms that separate this matter from our understanding of “life,” so we have no choice but to accept the cosmic water signature as our north star in our quest to find worlds that mirror our own.
That’s why scientists jump for joy a little bit whenever they find an exoplanet that has any chance of holding water — especially liquid water, rather than ice or water vapor. And hopefully at least one astronomer jumped for joy somewhere soon, because a team of researchers has solar system It may have a temperate water ocean about half the size of the Atlantic. Even better, the finding suggests, James Webb Space Telescope.
“Of all the temperate exoplanets currently known, LHS 1140 b may be our best chance to indirectly confirm the presence of liquid water on the surface of an alien world beyond our solar system,” says Charles Cadieux, lead author of a paper on the discovery and a doctoral student at the Université de Montréal. he said in a statement“This would be a major milestone in the search for potentially habitable exoplanets.”
Named LHS 1140 b exoplanet in orbit red dwarf about one-fifth the size of the star Sun and sitting 48 light years away Soil In the constellation Cetus, which, coincidentally, means “whale.” But the most important thing about LHS 1140 b is that it lives in its star’s habitable zone, or “Goldilocks zone.” As its nickname suggests, this is the region around a star that is neither too hot nor too cold for a planet to host liquid water, but fits the standard of the fairy-tale character Goldilocks. There’s a second big win for Earth.
Relating to: Nearby exoplanet may be rich in life-giving water, study finds
“This is the first time we’ve seen a hint of an atmosphere. habitable zone “a rocky or ice-rich exoplanet,” said Ryan MacDonald, NASA The team may have even found evidence of “air” on the star, Macdonald said in a statement, adding that the star is a Sagan Fellow in the University of Michigan’s Department of Astronomy, who helped analyze LHS 1140 b’s atmosphere.
But you may notice from the first part of that statement that MacDonald is suggesting that the exoplanet could be rocky or icy. This takes us back a bit.
LHS 1140b information
While it’s now making headlines because of the new study involving JWST data, LHS 1140 b has actually been on planet hunters’ radars for a while now. In fact, experts have theorized in the past that it could be a water world, and even shared similar sentiments about how it could provide humanity with the first direct evidence of it. extraplanetary liquid water. None of this is new. Cadieux had announced the world’s promise before, and an army of telescopes, including the now-retired Spitzer, have explored it in detail. Hubble space telescope and the Transiting Planet Survey Satellite (TESS).
But until now, there was something missing: the sharp eye of the James Webb Space Telescope.
It was necessary because for a long time there was a gap in the literature about LHS 1140 b. The main problem was that scientists could not fully confirm whether the exoplanet was a mini-Neptune, that is, a planet less massive than our original planet. Neptunebut still has Neptunian characteristics—or a super-Earth. A super-Earth is a world that is larger than Earth but is still rocky or water-rich. The latter often sounds the “potential habitability” alarm, and scientists imagine JWST could be the one to set it off.
This seems like a valid conclusion. As the team’s statement on the study puts it, their work not only “definitely rules out” the mini-Neptune scenario, but also confirms that the world could have a nitrogen-rich atmosphere like Earth. “While this is still only a tentative conclusion, the presence of a nitrogen-rich atmosphere suggests that the planet has a substantial atmosphere and creates conditions that could support liquid water,” he says.
It’s certainly important to note that LHS 1140 b isn’t entirely alone in its exciting features; there are also a number of habitable zone exoplanets that scientists are interested in. The most notable are probably TRAPPIST-1 system, a planetary arrangement that is almost disturbingly similar to the structure of our solar system. The seven of the spheres resemble our eight (goodbye, Pluto) and some of them are in the habitable zone like Earth.
However, a very interesting JWST study has recently complicated the search for habitability in TRAPPIST-1. It has been shown that the system’s anchor star is incredibly active, and that distortion Our observations lead us to believe that a world in the system is habitable, when in fact it is not. Even JWST has its limitations. So LHS 1140 b has a few special flourishes.
“The star LHS 1140 appears quieter and less active,” Macdonald reassured, “making it much less challenging to separate the atmosphere of LHS 1140 b from the stellar signals caused by starspots.”
Get ready for more features
The excitement around LHS 1140 b is contagious. There’s a lot to say about it.
For example, the JWST data suggests that the exoplanet could be between 10% and 20% liquid water, painting a fantastical picture of what the planet might look like in simple terms. It would essentially resemble a snowball orbiting its star with one side always facing that star. This is similar to the Moon’s orbit around Earth; we would never see the far side of the planet. moon because the moon rotates at the same speed as the earth. One side never faces us and the other side always faces us.
Similarly, if JWST’s rendering of LHS 1140 b is accurate, this means that the side of the planet that always faces the sun would be exposed to a lot of heat. This would be the part of the snowball that “melts” into a liquid ocean.
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That’s it.
“Current models suggest that if LHS 1140 b had an Earth-like atmosphere, it would be a snowball planet with a bull’s-eye ocean about 4,000 kilometers away. [2,485 miles] The ocean’s surface temperature, referred to as its “diameter,” could even be a “comfortable” 20 degrees Celsius (68 degrees Fahrenheit), the statement said.
Unfortunately, the team assures that much more work needs to be done to observe the nuances of LHS 1140 b, especially with JWST — it’s always good to have a clue to follow when looking for a needle in a large haystack. And as MacDonald says, “this is a very promising start.”
A preprint version of the work can be viewed on arXiv.