Possibly habitable Trappist-1 exoplanet caught destroying its own atmosphere

[Admin]

Trappist-1 e may be destroying its own atmosphere as it races around its red dwarf star host, showing there are many ways for planets to lose habitability. The findings could refine our search for life in the wider cosmos.

Possibly habitable Trappist-1 exoplanet caught destroying its own atmosphere : Read more

 

[rod]

The reference cited in this report is, ref - Heating of the Atmospheres of Short-orbit Exoplanets by Their Rapid Orbital Motion through an Extreme Space Environment, https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/1538-4357/ad206a, 16-Feb-2024.

Earlier before this article I read, Heating of the Atmospheres of Short-orbit Exoplanets by Their Rapid Orbital Motion Through an Extreme Space Environment, https://arxiv.org/abs/2401.14459

My note, this PDF report presents problems for astrobiology and habitable exoplanets orbiting close to red dwarf host stars. Many like TRAPPIST-1 e could have their atmospheres evaporating and change dramatically over long time scales. Exoplanets orbiting red dwarf stars could be losing much of their atmosphere due to Joule heating and magnetic field activity. Perhaps many are not astrobiology friendly places to visit

 

[Ultrahot]

To state that TRAPPIST-1e was "caught destroying its own atmosphere" is a gross misrepresentation of the paper and it's findings. The paper is purely theoretical and devoid of any observations which would "catch" the planet losing its atmosphere. Such atmospheric loss could have happened billions of years ago, especially since the author's are quoted as saying "Over millions of years, the planet could lose its atmosphere entirely to this phenomenon." If this *theoretical prediction* proves to be right, then it would be highly improbable that the planet would retain its atmosphere for billions of years until today given that this mass loss effect would be active throughout the planet's life.

 

[rod]

I note, there are other reports of exoplanets with apparent rapid atmosphere loss and decay.

Helium escapes from the atmosphere of a nearby exoplanet, observations find, https://phys.org/news/2023-08-helium-atmosphere-nearby-exoplanet.html

"Astronomers from the University of Chicago and elsewhere report the detection of an outflowing helium from the atmosphere of a nearby mini-Neptune exoplanet known as TOI-2134 b. The finding was detailed in a research paper published August 3 on the pre-print server arXiv..."

Ref - Outflowing helium from a mature mini-Neptune, https://arxiv.org/abs/2308.02002, 03-August-2023. "We announce the detection of escaping helium from TOI 2134b, a mini-Neptune a few Gyr old."

My note, the stellar evolution model age for the host star cannot contradict the atmosphere mass loss rate and the paper defends this view. A dating problem is apparent here. Some of these exoplanets could lose their atmospheres in a short time period than host star ages assigned, so explanations are offered with reconciliation calculations to show the host star ages are all correct, otherwise likely age dating conflicts are seen in some exoplanet studies now.

 

[TravelingModel]

This is what happened to Krypton

 

[Helio]

There are a number of issues I think have surfaced.

The modeling presented suggests that the circumstances for these very tight-orbiting exoplanets can have short-term atmospheres (millions of years). It's implied that they, perhaps in the protoplanetary phase, would have had atmospheres.

These exoplanets are likely all in resonance and all, or most likely, tidally locked. The resonance protects them from migrating inward. But tidal locking will likely do them more harm than the magnetic issues presented by this hypothesis.