Astronomers detect vaporized elements in atmosphere of hot Jupiter-sized exoplanet
Using the Gemini telescope in Hawaii, astronomers have detected several elements in atmosphere of hot Jupiter-sized exoplanet, dubbed WASP-76b, that would normally be found in rocks, but here are vaporized because the exoplanet orbits so close to its star.
In 2020 and 2021, using Gemini North’s MAROON-X (a new instrument specially designed to detect and study exoplanets), Pelletier and his team observed the planet as it passed in front of its host star on three separate occasions. These new observations uncovered a number of rock-forming elements in the atmosphere of WASP-76b, including sodium, potassium, lithium, nickel, manganese, chromium, magnesium, vanadium, barium, calcium, and, as previously detected, iron.
Due to the extreme temperatures of WASP-76b’s atmosphere, the elements detected by the researchers, which would normally form rocks here on Earth, are instead vaporized and thus present in the atmosphere in their gaseous forms. While these elements contribute to the composition of gas giants in our Solar System, those planets are too cold for the elements to vaporize into the atmosphere making them virtually undetectable.
The data not only suggests such elements exist in the solar system’s gas giants, but that such elements are common in solar systems elsewhere. That possibility increases the chances of other planets like Earth, capable of sustaining life as we know it, in addition to sustaining life as we don’t know it.
Readers!
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black. Your support allows me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Only now does it appear that Washington might finally recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are four ways of doing so:
1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.
2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation.
3. A Paypal Donation or subscription:
4. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
P.O.Box 1262
Cortaro, AZ 85652
You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above.
Using the Gemini telescope in Hawaii, astronomers have detected several elements in atmosphere of hot Jupiter-sized exoplanet, dubbed WASP-76b, that would normally be found in rocks, but here are vaporized because the exoplanet orbits so close to its star.
In 2020 and 2021, using Gemini North’s MAROON-X (a new instrument specially designed to detect and study exoplanets), Pelletier and his team observed the planet as it passed in front of its host star on three separate occasions. These new observations uncovered a number of rock-forming elements in the atmosphere of WASP-76b, including sodium, potassium, lithium, nickel, manganese, chromium, magnesium, vanadium, barium, calcium, and, as previously detected, iron.
Due to the extreme temperatures of WASP-76b’s atmosphere, the elements detected by the researchers, which would normally form rocks here on Earth, are instead vaporized and thus present in the atmosphere in their gaseous forms. While these elements contribute to the composition of gas giants in our Solar System, those planets are too cold for the elements to vaporize into the atmosphere making them virtually undetectable.
The data not only suggests such elements exist in the solar system’s gas giants, but that such elements are common in solar systems elsewhere. That possibility increases the chances of other planets like Earth, capable of sustaining life as we know it, in addition to sustaining life as we don’t know it.
Readers!
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black. Your support allows me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Only now does it appear that Washington might finally recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are four ways of doing so:
1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.
2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation.
3. A Paypal Donation or subscription:
4. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
P.O.Box 1262
Cortaro, AZ 85652
You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above.
Hot Jupiters are so hot they have trouble holding onto elements as are NOT heavy and/or metallic. Wasn’t sodium found in HD 209458b? That was some time ago.
Must be what’s left of Preplanus from Lost in Space their first planet they landed on