TRAPPIST-1 e, an Earth-sized exoplanet 40 light years away, may have an atmosphere that could support having liquid water on the planet’s surface in the form of a global ocean or icy surface, according to new research by an international collaboration including Cornell astronomers.
TRAPPIST-1 e, an Earth-sized exoplanet 40 light years away, may have an atmosphere that could support having liquid water on the planet’s surface in the form of a global ocean or icy surface, according to new research by an international collaboration including Cornell astronomers.
“TRAPPIST-1 is a very different star from our Sun, and so the planetary system around it is also very different, which challenges both our observational and theoretical assumptions,” said Nikole Lewis, associate professor of astronomy in the College of Arts and Sciences, who is PI of the program.
The team’s initial results indicating the possibility of an atmosphere on TRAPPIST-1 e, and a paper describing the theory behind the findings, published Sept. 8 in the Astrophysical Journal Letters. Elijah Mullens, a doctoral candidate in astronomy, and Ryan Challener, postdoctoral researcher at the Cornell Center for Astrophysics and Planetary Science (A&S), are co-authors.
Seven Earth-sized worlds orbit the red dwarf star TRAPPIST-1. Of those, planet e is of particular interest because it orbits the star in the habitable zone, a distance from the star where liquid surface water is theoretically possible. Researchers aimed NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope’s powerful near-infrared spectrograph (NIRSpec) instrument at the system as planet e transited, or passed in front of, TRAPPIST-1.
Read More: Cornell University
Image: The Earth-size exoplanet TRAPPIST-1 e, depicted at the lower right, is silhouetted as it passes in front of its flaring host star in this artist’s concept of the TRAPPIST-1 system. (Credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, J. Olmsted (STScI))
