Humans have never stopped their quest to find another world that hosts living organisms. During this journey, they discovered many fascinating things. Among them, let’s dive into the realm of exoplanets.
The planets in our solar system revolve around the Sun. Planets that orbit other stars are called exoplanets.
Exoplanets are very difficult to watch directly using telescopes. The bright glow of the stars in orbit hides them. Though the first possible evidence of an exoplanet was found in 1917, it was not recognized.
This was later confirmed, as the detection took place in 1992. Exoplanets can be of four types. They are–gas giant, Neptunian, super-Earth and terrestrial, with sub-categories such as mini-Neptunes within these groups.
So, what makes them the center of attraction? They provide fundamental clues to our understanding of how our own solar system came to be and how Earth was created.
Exoplanets can be different from each other. Astronomers have confirmed the existence of more than 5,000 exoplanets, but a relatively small number of these worlds are Earth-like. Among them is a mysterious variety known as “super-Earths” because they are larger than our world and possibly rocky.
If a super-Earth is ejected from its star system and has a thick atmosphere and watery surface, it can sustain life for tens of billions of years, far longer than life on Earth could survive before the Sun dies.
Heller and Armstrong proposed to create a profile for exoplanets by star type, mass, and location in their planetary system, among other things.
According to them, such super-habitable worlds are likely to be larger, hotter, and older than Earth. Exoplanets may be hot enough to boil metal or locked in the deep freeze.
There are many questions about exoplanets. What color it is, what it looks like, how it works? etc. So that we can answer them, let us know how these planets are formed.
They emerge from a giant doughnut-shaped disk of gas and dust that orbits young stars. Gravity and other forces cause the material inside the disc to collide. If the precipitation is mild enough, the material will coalesce and grow like rolling snowballs.
Exoplanets are composed of elements similar to those of the planets in our solar system, but their compositions of these elements may differ. Among them, some planets may be dominated by water or ice, while others are by iron or carbon.
Gas giants with large radii and very low density are sometimes called “bloated planets” or “hot Saturns” because their density is similar to that of Saturn.
Bloated planets orbit close to their stars, so the intense heat from the star combined with internal heating inside the planet will help inflate the atmosphere. The hairiest exoplanet is TOI-1420b.
Many exoplanets probably have rings, just like the ones we see in our own solar system. So far we have only found one set of exorings.
The giant planet (which could possibly be a brown dwarf) known as “Super Saturn” orbiting the star J1407 has 30 rings, each tens of millions of kilometres in diameter.
Do exoplanets contain air, water? Using mathematical models, scientists estimate that more than a quarter of known exoplanets may have liquid water, although most would have subsurface oceans like those on Europa and Enceladus. Some of these planets may be home to vast watery oceans under their frigid surfaces.
Scientists have found an abiotic source of oxygen that comes from sulfur dioxide. Terrestrial volcanic exoplanets may have oxygen in their atmospheres.
NASA studies exoplanets, although they are very difficult to detect and distinguish directly from their host star. But the ultimate goal is to find out if there are exoplanets that show signs of possible life that we know how to interpret.
Since the distance between these planets and Earth is huge, it is not possible for humans to travel to these planets.
- Some Fast Facts About Exoplanets
Hottest : KELT-9b
Largest: TrES-4b
Smallest: Kepler-37b
Darkest: TrES-2b
- They also differ in color. GJ 504b is the exoplanet that is made of pink gas. Other interesting facts are –
HD 189773b – where glass rains sideways.
TOI 849 b – the world laid bare.
WASP-12b – a bloated planet in a death spiral.
Rogue Worlds: Exoplanets on the Loose.
55 Cancri e – diamond planet.
TrES-2b – the darkest exoplanet.
HR 5183b – the planet with the strangest orbit.
K2-18b – where you can evaporate while swimming.
HAT-P-7b – an ultra-hot Jupiter, dark as charcoal with a sapphire sky.
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Writer
Afsana Khanom Monika
Intern, Content Writing Department
YSSE