While previous studies have shown a strong preference for a future mid-infrared nulling interferometer space mission to detect habitable zone planets around M-dwarfs, we here focus on a more conservative […]
extrasolar
Posted inExoplanets, -moons, -comets, Habitable Zones, Press Release, Water/Hycean Worlds & Oceanography
CO2 Ocean Bistability On Terrestrial Exoplanets
Cycling of carbon dioxide between the atmosphere and interior of rocky planets can stabilize global climate and enable planetary surface temperatures above freezing over geologic time.
Posted inAstronomy & Telescopes, Biosignatures & Paleobiology, Exoplanets, -moons, -comets, Imaging & Spectroscopy, Press Release
Atmospheric Retrievals For LIFE And Other Future Space Missions: The Importance Of Mitigating Systematic Effects
Atmospheric retrieval studies are essential to determine the science requirements for future generation missions, such as the Large Interferometer for Exoplanets (LIFE).
Posted inExoplanets, -moons, -comets, Habitable Zones, Press Release, Water/Hycean Worlds & Oceanography
A Day At The Beach For Life On Other Worlds
New simulations show that truly Earth-like exoplanets with oceans and continents, and beaches along the boundaries, may be much more common around red dwarfs than previously expected.
Posted inExoplanets, -moons, -comets, Habitable Zones, Press Release
Modification Of The Radioactive Heat Budget Of Earth-like Exoplanets By The Loss Of Primordial Atmospheres
The initial abundance of radioactive heat producing isotopes in the interior of a terrestrial planet are important drivers of its thermal evolution and the related tectonics and possible evolution to […]
Posted inExoplanets, -moons, -comets, Habitable Zones, Impact events, Press Release
Reduced Late Bombardment On Rocky Exoplanets Around M-dwarfs
Ocean-vaporizing impacts of chemically reduced planetesimals onto the early Earth have been suggested to catalyse atmospheric production of reduced nitrogen compounds and trigger prebiotic synthesis despite an oxidized lithosphere.
Posted inExoplanets, -moons, -comets, Press Release, Space Weather & Heliophysics
Superflares On Solar-like Stars: A New Method For Identifying The True Flare Sources In Photometric Surveys
Over the past years, thousands of stellar flares have been detected by harvesting data from large photometric surveys.
Posted inBiosignatures & Paleobiology, Exoplanets, -moons, -comets, Habitable Zones, Imaging & Spectroscopy, Press Release
Is LTT 1445 Ab a Hycean World or a cold Haber World? Exploring the Potential of Twinkle to Unveil Its Nature
We explore the prospects for Twinkle to determine the atmospheric composition of the nearby terrestrial-like planet LTT 1445 Ab, including the possibility of detecting the potential biosignature ammonia (NH3).
Posted inBiosignatures & Paleobiology, Exoplanets, -moons, -comets, Habitable Zones, Press Release
A New Method for Finding Nearby White Dwarf Exoplanets and Detecting Biosignatures
We demonstrate that the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) can detect infrared (IR) excess from the blended light spectral energy distribution of spatially unresolved terrestrial exoplanets orbiting nearby white dwarfs.
Posted inBiosignatures & Paleobiology, Exoplanets, -moons, -comets, Habitable Zones, Imaging & Spectroscopy, Press Release, Proxima Centauri
Lightning-induced Chemistry On tidally-locked Earth-like Exoplanets
Determining the habitability and interpreting atmospheric spectra of exoplanets requires understanding their atmospheric physics and chemistry.