The Hubble Space Telescope has detected the presence of water vapor in the atmosphere of an exoplanet

The James Webb Space Telescope isn't the only telescope trying to detect and catalog aliens Exoplanets. This will allow us to understand how common Earth-like planets are, how planetary systems have evolved, and obviously look at the possibility of finding extraterrestrial life. at recent days Hubble Space Telescope He is Don Water vapor NileAtmosphere from U.S Exoplanet An Earth-like floor, opening up new possibilities for the search for life (even if the mere presence of water is not enough).

to'Exoplanet Takes a name gigajoules 9827 d (Discovered by Kepler in 2017) Its diameter is at most twice the diameter of the Earth and it is located on 97 light years From Earth, in the constellation Pisces, it orbits a red dwarf every 6.2 days. The researchers explained during the announcement that it is not yet clear how much water is in the atmosphere, as it could be a small amount in a hydrogen-rich atmosphere or whether there is actually a lot of water.

Hubble Space Telescope and the Exoplanet GJ 9827 D

gigajoules 9827 d They are not very hospitable when considering human characteristics. In fact it will be approximately the same temperature 425°C (Similar to Venus) Hencewater It will be present in form steam. There are still many hypotheses and it will be necessary to conduct more research and collect a lot of data before they are properly characterized, also thanks to Hubble Space Telescope. In this case, the HST's WFC3 (Wide Field Camera 3) instrument was used, exploiting near-infrared wavelengths. Researchers expect that the James Webb Space Telescope will also help capture useful data for this planet and other exoplanets thanks to its increased sensitivity.

Among the plausible scenarios involving gigajoules 9827 d We find, for example, a rocky planet with a lot of hydrogen and a little water, but also a terrestrial planet that is half rock and half water (similar to Jupiter's moon Europa, but much hotter). It is also believed that the planet was far from its star and had large reserves of ice that later became steam, or that the planet was closer to the star and moved away from it.

I Hubble Space Telescope He is Don gigajoules 9827 d For eleven transits (during three years) the exoplanet passed in front of its host star. Full data and analysis is available In the study By title Water absorption in the transmission spectrum of the Water World filter GJ 9827 d. Björn Beneke (from the University of Montreal) mentioned that “This will be the first time we can show directly through atmospheric detection that these planets with water-rich atmospheres can indeed exist around other stars. This is an important step toward determining the prevalence and diversity of atmospheres on rocky planets.”.