Feb 18, 2025 07:46 PM
(This post was last modified: Feb 18, 2025 08:03 PM by C C.)
Breaking the curse of the Habitable Zone
https://www.universetoday.com/170939/bre...able-zone/
INTRO: The Habitable Zone is a central concept in our explorations for life outside the Earth. Is it time to abandon it?
The Habitable Zone is defined as the region around a star where liquid water can exist on the surface of a planet. At first glance, that seems like a good starting place to hunt for alien life in other systems. After all, there’s only one kind of life known in the universe (ours) and it exists in the Habitable Zone of the Sun.
But researchers have long noted that the Habitable Zone concept is far too restrictive. Besides the examples of the icy moons in our own solar system, life itself is able to alter the chemistry of a planet, shifting its ability to retain or remove heat, meaning that the un-habitable regions of a distant system might be more clement than we thought... (MORE - details)
“Out of science fiction”: First 3D observations of an exoplanet’s atmosphere reveal a unique climate
https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/1073785
INTRO: Astronomers have peered through the atmosphere of a planet beyond the Solar System, mapping its 3D structure for the first time. By combining all four telescope units of the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope (ESO’s VLT), they found powerful winds carrying chemical elements like iron and titanium, creating intricate weather patterns across the planet’s atmosphere. The discovery opens the door for detailed studies of the chemical makeup and weather of other alien worlds.
“This planet’s atmosphere behaves in ways that challenge our understanding of how weather works — not just on Earth, but on all planets. It feels like something out of science fiction,” says Julia Victoria Seidel, a researcher at the European Southern Observatory (ESO) in Chile and lead author of the study, published today in Nature.
The planet, WASP-121b (also known as Tylos), is some 900 light-years away in the constellation Puppis. It’s an ultra-hot Jupiter, a gas giant orbiting its host star so closely that a year there lasts only about 30 Earth hours. Moreover, one side of the planet is scorching, as it is always facing the star, while the other side is much cooler.
The team has now probed deep inside Tylos’s atmosphere and revealed distinct winds in separate layers, forming a map of the atmosphere’s 3D structure. It’s the first time astronomers have been able to study the atmosphere of a planet outside our Solar System in such depth and detail.
“What we found was surprising: a jet stream rotates material around the planet’s equator, while a separate flow at lower levels of the atmosphere moves gas from the hot side to the cooler side. This kind of climate has never been seen before on any planet,” says Seidel, who is also a researcher at the Lagrange Laboratory, part of the Observatoire de la Côte d'Azur, in France. The observed jet stream spans half of the planet, gaining speed and violently churning the atmosphere high up in the sky as it crosses the hot side of Tylos. “Even the strongest hurricanes in the Solar System seem calm in comparison,” she adds... (MORE - details, no ads)
https://www.universetoday.com/170939/bre...able-zone/
INTRO: The Habitable Zone is a central concept in our explorations for life outside the Earth. Is it time to abandon it?
The Habitable Zone is defined as the region around a star where liquid water can exist on the surface of a planet. At first glance, that seems like a good starting place to hunt for alien life in other systems. After all, there’s only one kind of life known in the universe (ours) and it exists in the Habitable Zone of the Sun.
But researchers have long noted that the Habitable Zone concept is far too restrictive. Besides the examples of the icy moons in our own solar system, life itself is able to alter the chemistry of a planet, shifting its ability to retain or remove heat, meaning that the un-habitable regions of a distant system might be more clement than we thought... (MORE - details)
“Out of science fiction”: First 3D observations of an exoplanet’s atmosphere reveal a unique climate
https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/1073785
INTRO: Astronomers have peered through the atmosphere of a planet beyond the Solar System, mapping its 3D structure for the first time. By combining all four telescope units of the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope (ESO’s VLT), they found powerful winds carrying chemical elements like iron and titanium, creating intricate weather patterns across the planet’s atmosphere. The discovery opens the door for detailed studies of the chemical makeup and weather of other alien worlds.
“This planet’s atmosphere behaves in ways that challenge our understanding of how weather works — not just on Earth, but on all planets. It feels like something out of science fiction,” says Julia Victoria Seidel, a researcher at the European Southern Observatory (ESO) in Chile and lead author of the study, published today in Nature.
The planet, WASP-121b (also known as Tylos), is some 900 light-years away in the constellation Puppis. It’s an ultra-hot Jupiter, a gas giant orbiting its host star so closely that a year there lasts only about 30 Earth hours. Moreover, one side of the planet is scorching, as it is always facing the star, while the other side is much cooler.
The team has now probed deep inside Tylos’s atmosphere and revealed distinct winds in separate layers, forming a map of the atmosphere’s 3D structure. It’s the first time astronomers have been able to study the atmosphere of a planet outside our Solar System in such depth and detail.
“What we found was surprising: a jet stream rotates material around the planet’s equator, while a separate flow at lower levels of the atmosphere moves gas from the hot side to the cooler side. This kind of climate has never been seen before on any planet,” says Seidel, who is also a researcher at the Lagrange Laboratory, part of the Observatoire de la Côte d'Azur, in France. The observed jet stream spans half of the planet, gaining speed and violently churning the atmosphere high up in the sky as it crosses the hot side of Tylos. “Even the strongest hurricanes in the Solar System seem calm in comparison,” she adds... (MORE - details, no ads)