exoplanets Archives

February 10, 2021February 10, 2021 by Matt Williams

Super-Earth Conditions Simulated in the Lab to Discover if They’re Habitable

An artist’s conception of the magnetic fields of selected super-Earths as the Z machine, pictured at bottom, mimics the gravitational conditions on other planets. Credits: Eric Lundin; Z photo by Randy Montoya

Deep inside planet Earth, there is a liquid outer core and a solid inner core that counter-rotate with each other. This creates the dynamo effect that is responsible for generating Earth’s planetary magnetic field. Also known as a magnetosphere, this field keeps our climate stable by preventing Earth’s atmosphere from being lost to space. So when studying rocky exoplanets, scientists naturally wonder if they too have magnetospheres.

Unfortunately, until we can measure an exoplanet’s magnetic fields, we are forced to infer their existence from the available evidence. This is precisely what researchers at the Sandia National Laboratories did with its Z Pulsed Power Facility (PPF). Along with their partners at the Carnegie Institution for Science, they were able to replicate the gravitational pressures of “Super-Earths” to see if they could generate magnetic fields.

February 8, 2021February 23, 2023 by Matt Williams

What Are Extrasolar Planets?

An exoplanet about ten times Jupiter's mass located some 330 light years from Earth. X-ray: NASA/CXC/SAO/I.Pillitteri et al; Optical: DSS; Illustration: NASA/CXC/M.Weiss

For countless generations, human beings have looked out at the night sky and wondered if they were alone in the Universe. With the discovery of other planets in our Solar System, the true extent of the Milky Way galaxy, and other galaxies beyond our own, this question has only deepened and become more profound.

And whereas astronomers and scientists have long suspected that other star systems in our galaxy and the Universe had orbiting planets of their own, it has only been within the last few decades that any have been observed. Over time, the methods for detecting these “extrasolar planets” have improved, and the list of those whose existence has been confirmed has grown accordingly (over 4000 and counting!)

February 4, 2021February 1, 2021 by Paul M. Sutter

Astronomers are now Finding Planetary Disks Around the Smallest, Least Massive Stars

Astronomers have been watching planetary systems form around sun-like stars for decades. And now, new observations with the ALMA telescope reveal the same process playing out around the smallest, but most common, stars in galaxy.

February 3, 2021February 1, 2021 by Paul M. Sutter

A new Class of Exoplanets can Shrink, From Subneptunes Into Superearths

Illustration of the inferred size of the super-Earth CoRoT-7b (center) in comparison with Earth and Neptune. Image Credit: By Aldaron, a.k.a. Aldaron - Own work, incorporating public domain images for reference planets (see below), inspired by Thingg's size comparison, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=8854176

Mighty planets can be whittled down, leaving behind only their rocky cores, becoming nothing bigger than superearths. While astronomers had long suspected that this could happen, a new study reveals that it can occur in as little as a billion years.

February 1, 2021February 1, 2021 by Matt Williams

A Sunlike Star Found With Four (No, Five!) Exoplanets Orbiting It

This artist’s impression shows the view from the planet in the TOI-178 system found orbiting furthest from the star. New research by Adrien Leleu and his colleagues with several telescopes, including ESO’s Very Large Telescope, has revealed that the system boasts six exoplanets and that all but the one closest to the star are locked in a rare rhythm as they move in their orbits. Image Credit: ESO/L. Calçada/spaceengine.org

In just nine months (October 31st, 2021), NASA’s long-awaited James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) will finally be launched to space. Once operational, this next-generation observatory will use its powerful infrared imaging capabilities to study all kinds of cosmological phenomena. It will also be essential to the characterization of extrasolar planets and their atmospheres to see if any are habitable.

In anticipation of this, astronomers have been designating exoplanets as viable candidates for follow-up studies. Using data from the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS), an international team led by MIT researchers discovered four new exoplanets orbiting a Sun-like star about 200 light-years from Earth. This system could be an ideal place for James Webb to spot a habitable planet.

February 1, 2021February 1, 2021 by Paul M. Sutter

White Dwarf Atmospheres Might Contain the Pulverized Crusts of Their Dead Planets

Illustration of the internal layers of a white dwarf star. Credit: University of Warwick/Mark Garlick

Astronomers have developed a new technique to search for exoplanets – by looking for their crushed up bones in the atmospheres of white dwarfs. And it’s working.

January 28, 2021January 28, 2021 by Evan Gough

Exoplanetary System Found With 6 Worlds in Orbital Resonance

200 light-years away from Earth, there’s a K-type main-sequence star named TOI (TESS Object of Interest) 178. When Adrian Leleu, an astrophysicist at the Center for Space and Habitability of the University of Bern, observed it, it appeared to have two planets orbiting it at roughly the same distance. But that turned out to be incorrect. In fact, six exoplanets orbit the smallish star.

And five of those six are locked into an unexpected orbital configuration.

January 26, 2021January 26, 2021 by Evan Gough

One of the Oldest Stars in the Galaxy has a Planet. Rocky Planets Were Forming at Nearly the Beginning of the Universe

Artist's rendition of TOI-561, one of the oldest, most metal-poor planetary systems discovered yet in the Milky Way galaxy. This 10 billion-year-old system has a hot, rocky exoplanet (center) that's one and a half times the size of Earth as well as two gas planets (to the left of the rocky planet) that are about twice as large as Earth. Credit: W. M. Keck Observatory/Adam Makarenko

Would it be surprising to find a rocky planet that dates back to the very early Universe? It should be. The early Universe lacked the heavier elements necessary to form rocky planets.

But astronomers have found one, right here in the Milky Way.

December 30, 2020December 30, 2020 by Andy Tomaswick

Astronomers Capture a Direct Image of a Brown Dwarf

First direct image of a brown dwarf star in a system not unlike our own.

The field of exoplanet photography is just getting underway, with astronomers around the world striving to capture clear images of the more than 4000 exoplanets discovered to date. Some of these exoplanets are more interesting to image and research than others. That is certainly the case for a type of exoplanet called a brown dwarf. And now scientists have captured the first ever image of exactly that type of exoplanet.

December 13, 2020December 14, 2020 by Matt Williams

If We Used the Sun as a Gravitational Lens Telescope, This is What a Planet at Proxima Centauri Would Look Like

mage of a simulated Earth, at 1024×1024 pixel resolution, at the distance of Proxima Centauri,at 1.3 pc, as projectedby the SGL to an image plane at 650 AU from the Sun. Credit: Toth H. & Turyshev, S.G.

As Einstein originally predicted with his General Theory of Relativity, gravity alters the curvature of spacetime. As a consequence, the passage of light changes as it encounters a gravitational field, which is how General Relativity was confirmed! For decades, astronomers have taken advantage of this to conduct Gravitational Lensing (GL) – where a distant source is focused and amplified by a massive object in the foreground.

In a recent study, two theoretical physicists argue that the Sun could be used in the same way to create a Solar Gravitational Lens (SGL). This powerful telescope, they argue, would provide enough light amplification to allow for Direct Imaging studies of nearby exoplanets. This could allow astronomers to determine if planets like Proxima b are potentially-habitable long before we send missions to study them.