Hydrogen cyanide (HCN) is crucial for the RNA World hypothesis, forming biomolecules essential for early life.
The Rocky Worlds DDT Core Implementation Team (CIT) will soon launch the Rocky Worlds DDT Data Challenge, aimed at engaging the community in the analysis and interpretation of JWST MIRI […]
A particularly intriguing subclass of rocky exoplanets are the ultra-short period (USP) worlds that orbit their host stars in less than a day. These planets are particularly rare around M […]
Rocky exoplanets are particularly abundant around M-type stars. Their small radii and low luminosities provide favourable conditions for detecting transiting terrestrial planets and probing their atmospheric properties.
![Earth’s spectrum over time (right panel), reproduced from [11]. The biosignature gases present change dramatically from epoch to epoch (left panel), producing significantly different spectra. The simultaneous detection of O2 at 0.8 µm demonstrates the presence of life in the modern Earth spectrum shown in the bottom right panel, but for habitable planets without much evidence of oxygenic biosignatures (e.g. Proterozoic and Archean Earth), coverage beyond 0.8 µm will be key to capture H2O, and CH4 features. -- astro-ph.IM](https://i0.wp.com/astrobiology.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/03/The-Key-to-Unlocking-Exoplanet.png?resize=1200%2C719&ssl=1)
The detection of life on rocky exoplanets in the habitable zones of nearby stars would be a paradigm-shifting advance, and it is one of the greatest scientific challenges of our […]
While recent planet-formation models broadly reproduce the observed population of super-Earths and mini-Neptunes, as well as the bimodal radius distribution (the “radius valley”), it remains unclear whether all these planets […]
Among potentially habitable worlds, rocky planets orbiting M dwarfs offer the most favorable prospects for atmospheric characterization, yet their climates may differ substantially from those of Earth analogs.
The demographics of Kepler planets provide a key testbed for models of planet formation and evolution, particularly for explaining the radius valley separating super-Earths and sub-Neptunes.
An international scientific team, led by the University of Warwick and involving the Canary Islands Institute of Astrophysics, has used the European Space Agency’s Cheops satellite to discover that the […]
The correlation between inner super-Earths (SEs) and outer cold Jupiters (CJs) provides an important constraint on the formation and dynamical evolution of planetary systems. Previous studies have suggested a positive […]
