Webb telescope finds a 'hot Jupiter' exoplanet that defies expectations

[Admin]

The atmospheres of gas giant planets across the Milky Way galaxy can be very different from those in the solar system, the James Webb Space Telescope has found.

Webb telescope finds a 'hot Jupiter' exoplanet that defies expectations : Read more

 

[rod]

I note here some important information presented in the article.

"By measuring the atmospheric composition of a planet, scientists can get an insight into the chemistry of its parent star and the material from which it formed millions or billions of years ago. The planetary disk that gave rise to Smertrios must have had much more carbon compared to oxygen than the disk that birthed our solar system, the study found. The researchers plan to study more hot Jupiter planets in the coming year, with the hope of finding "statistical trends" behind the diversity of their chemical compositions. "The origin of this diversity is a fundamental mystery in our understanding of planet formation," Bean said. "Our hope is that further atmospheric observations of extrasolar planets with JWST will quantify this diversity better and yield constraints on more complex trends that might exist. We have shown definitively that the atmospheric compositions of giant extrasolar planets do not follow the same trend that is so clear in the solar system planets," he added."

Apparently postulated protoplanetary discs that contain carbon content, likely do not *create* exoplanets with much water. The phys.org report made this clear on the exoplanet.

"Together, these observations paint a picture of a planet-forming disk with abundant solids that were carbon-rich," Lunine said. "HD149026b acquired large amounts of this material as it formed." While an abundance of carbon might seem favorable for chances of life, a high carbon to oxygen ratio actually means less water on a planet or in a planetary system—a problem for life as we know it. ", https://phys.org/news/2023-03-james-webb-space-telescope-giant.html

We now have at least two reports of smaller, perhaps rocky exoplanets with no atmospheres (https://forums.space.com/threads/ja...ere-on-earth-like-trappist-1-exoplanet.60653/), and now an exoplanet in the Saturn size with too much carbon in it, thus water formation becomes a problem assuming a protoplanetary disc evolutionary model for their origins. Some objective and significant differences appear now in exoplanet studies when compared with Earth and our solar system. More constraints seem to appear for astrobiology and the hope (belief) of finding biological life somewhere else in the galaxy, showing Earth is just one of many habitable worlds where abiogenesis created life from non-living matter.

 

[murgatroyd]

Thank you @rod. Sounds like the Rare Earth hypothesis has just been strengthened.

Of course, the picture could change pending future discoveries. I hope that astronomers are able to get data on the stars that came from the same dust cloud as our Sun and that should have near-identical abundances of heavier elements than H and He. Unfortunately, none of these sibling stars are close to us (on a galactic scale) anymore.

 

[rod]

At present, we do have a Rare Earth This site shows 5340 exoplanets now, http://exoplanet.eu/, and the NASA archive site shows 5312, https://exoplanetarchive.ipac.caltech.edu/index.html

I do not see any that are confirmed as earth like with abundant water and life thriving on any of those exoplanets, so at the moment, very rare Earth