Astronomers Discover Two “Super-Earth” Planets About 100 Light-Years Away



Recently, two "super-Earth" planets orbiting LP 890-9, a dim, cold star around 100 light-years from Earth, were found by an international scientific team. After the well-known TRAPPIST-1, the star is also known as TOI-4306 or SPECULOOS-2 and is the second-coolest star discovered to host planets. An article on this uncommon discovery will soon appear in the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics.

The inner planet of the system, LP 890-9b, is only 2.7 days away from finishing its circle around the star and is roughly 30% larger than Earth. The NASA Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS), a satellite project looking for exoplanets orbiting nearby stars, first recognized this first exoplanet as a potential planet candidate. The SPECULOOS (Search for livable Planets EClipsing ULtra-cOOl Stars) telescopes, one of which is run by the University of Birmingham, confirmed and characterized this candidate. Then, using their telescopes, SPECULOOS researchers looked for more transiting planets in the system that TESS might have overlooked.

According to Laetitia Delrez, a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Liège and the lead author of the new research article, "TESS searches for exoplanets using the transit method, by monitoring the brightness of thousands of stars simultaneously, looking for slight dimmings that might be caused by planets passing in front of their stars."

To confirm that the observed candidates are planets and to improve the measurements of their sizes and orbital characteristics, a follow-up with ground-based telescopes is frequently essential.

The need of this follow-up is especially crucial in the case of extremely cold stars like LP 890-9. This is due to the fact that they mostly generate near-infrared light, for which TESS has a relatively low sensitivity.

On the other hand, the SPECULOOS project's telescopes, which are situated at ESO's Paranal Observatory in Chile and on the island of Tenerife, are designed to make highly accurate observations of this kind of star. This is due to the fact that their cameras have excellent near-infrared sensitivity.

According to Michal Gillon, the project's principal investigator from the University of Liège, "The goal of SPECULOOS is to search for potentially habitable terrestrial planets transiting some of the smallest and coolest stars in the solar neighborhood, such as the TRAPPIST-1 planetary system, which we discovered in 2016." This tactic is driven by the fact that such planets are particularly well adapted to in-depth atmospheric research and the hunt for conceivable chemical signs of life with powerful telescopes like the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST).

The SPECULOOS studies of LP 890-9 were quite successful because they helped identify a second, previously undiscovered exoplanet in addition to confirming the first planet. Although it is slightly larger than the first planet (approximately 40% larger than Earth), the second planet, LP 890-9c (renamed SPECULOOS-2c by the SPECULOOS researchers), has a longer orbital period of around 8.5 days. This orbital period placed the planet in what is known as the "habitable zone" surrounding its star, which was later confirmed by the MuSCAT3 instrument in Hawaii.

Amaury Triaud says that the habitable zone is the idea that a planet with Earth-like geological and atmospheric characteristics would have a surface temperature that would allow water to remain liquid for billions of years. He directs the SPECULOOS working group, which planned the observations that led to the finding of the second planet. He is a professor of exoplanetology at the University of Birmingham. This grants us permission to continue our observations and determine whether the planet has an atmosphere, in which case we can examine its composition and judge the planet's habitability.

The next stage will be to investigate this planet's atmosphere, perhaps with the JWST. Among the known potentially habitable terrestrial planets, LP 890-9c appears to be the second-most promising target for the JWST, trailing only the TRAPPIST-1 planets (for which Professor Triaud was also a co-discoverer).

Professor Triaud continued, "It is crucial to find as many temperate terrestrial worlds as possible to study the variety of exoplanet climates and, eventually, to be able to quantify how frequently biology has emerged in the cosmos.

A nearby late-type M dwarf is being transited by two temperate super-Earths. Astronomy & Astrophysics, 7 August 2022.

The European Research Council (ERC) grant BEBOP, two grants from the Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC), and an investment by the University of Birmingham to buy a SPECULOOS telescope all provided financing for this research at Birmingham.

The University of Liège's (Michael Gillon, project leader) SPECULOOS initiative is carried out in collaboration with the Universities of Cambridge, Birmingham, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Bern, the Canary Islands Institute of Astrophysics, and the European Southern Observatory (ESO). It is based on a network of robotic telescopes, the main nodes of which are the observatories SPECULOOS-South at the ESO's Paranal Observatory in Chile (4 telescopes) and SPECULOOS-North in Tenerife (at present 1 telescope), with the SAINT-EX (1 telescope) and TRAPPIST (2 telescopes, one in Chile and one in Morocco) telescopes serving as auxiliary nodes.

By UNIVERSITY OF BIRMINGHAM 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Do You Sleep on Your Back or Side? Here's The Research on 'Optimal' Sleep Positions

Image
William Dement, a renowned sleep researcher at Stanford University, is quoted as saying that after 50 years of study, the only reason he can think of for why we sleep is "because we become sleepy." Sleep certainly matters for our health and wellbeing even though it may be, as one researcher put it, "the sole major habit in quest of a function." Do we, however, have it right? What do studies on sleeping positions say? Is there a proper sleeping position? The majority of people favor sleeping on their side. This is encouraging news because people who sleep on their backs are more likely to have trouble falling asleep or breathing during the night. Most of the time, we have a tendency to shift around quite a bit at night. According to a study involving 664 sleepers, on average, participants slept on their side 54% of the time, their back 37% of the time, and their front 7% of the time. Males are more likely to change positions throughout the night and move their arms, ...
Read more

The Science of Beards

Image
Here are a few facts that scientists have learned about beards as the world prepares to celebrate amazing facial hair on World Beard Day (September 3). Strong Manly Beard Men who have beards appear to be more dominant, aggressive, and strong, according to numerous studies[1][2][3] that have been conducted. In fact, men claim that growing facial hair makes them feel[4] more manly. Men who choose to grow beards tend to have higher testosterone levels than men who choose to keep their faces clean-shaven, according to research. They are also more likely to be hostile sexists, or to support the patriarchy and male dominance, as well as to believe that women belong in the kitchen, according to research on this topic. The beards (and muscles) on these males might be used to enforce gender roles. Professor R. D. Guthrie proposed in his book "Evolution of human threat display organs" from the 1970s that beards could be utilized to scare male rivals by improving aggressive and threaten...
Read more

Scientists Uncover a Surprising Connection Between Appetite and Sun Exposure

Image
Recent studies from Tel Aviv University show that women are not affected by sun exposure on their hunger levels, but males are. The study shows how the metabolic pathway is engaged differently in men and women. It was carried out utilizing lab models. Males of both animal and human species, as well as those exposed to the sun, are reportedly triggered to produce a protein called p53 that repairs any DNA damage that may have been done to the skin as a result of the exposure. The body produces the hunger-inducing hormone ghrelin in response to p53 activation. In females, the hormone estrogen stops p53 from interacting with ghrelin, preventing the desire to eat after being in the sun. The ground-breaking investigation was directed by professor Carmit Levy and Ph.D. candidate Shivang Parikh of the Department of Human Genetics and Biochemistry at TAU's Sackler Faculty of Medicine. In addition to the Tel Aviv Sourasky (Ichilov), Assuta, Meir, and Sheba Medical Centers, Drs. Yiftach Gepne...
Read more