New ultra-hot exoplanet twice as big as the uncovered earth; Evidence of extraterrestrial life?

When astronomers search for exoplanets, they usually search for planets whose temperature is sufficient to support liquid water on their surface and which must have a habitable atmosphere. Such planets are considered the best options to search for extraterrestrial life. But some exoplanets have the mysterious atmosphere and this is the case of the new planet.

The newly discovered planet called Wolf 503b is about twice as big as the earth. But scientists are not sure of the surface of this planet. The researchers are not able to understand if the exoplanet has a surface like a hard and rocky land or if it is a planet made of gas.

The team of researchers from Canada, the United States and Germany said it would not be easy to get to Wolf 503b because of its proximity to the star. .

The study's lead author, Merrin Peterson, a student at the Exoplanet Research Institute, said, "The discovery and confirmation of this new exoplanet have been very fast, thanks to the collaboration of my adviser Björn Benneke and myself. part of."

Benneke, co-author of the study, said in a statement that this mysterious planet is "one of the only planets with a near-far radius that has a star bright enough to be studied in more detail and better to constrain his true nature. "

"This provides a key opportunity to better understand the origin of this gap as well as the nature of intriguing populations of 'super-lands' and 'sub-neptunes' as a whole," added Benneke.

Peterson said in a statement that in May, after receiving data from Kepler K2, "we quickly launched a program that allowed us to find as many interesting exoplanets as possible. Wolf 503b was one of them.

During the process, the team learned that this exoplanet, as well as its star, are relatively close to Earth, since they are located about 145 light-years away from the blue planet, in the constellation of the Virgin.

The researchers said that if engineers complete the James Webb Space Telescope, they will definitely check out this newly found planet. The launch of this telescope is planned for the beginning of 2021. It is also planned to build more powerful telescopes so that scientists can easily look at the atmosphere of the plant to find traces of hydrogen and water on the surface.

"The brightness of the host star makes the Wolf 503b a prime target for fast tracking of radial velocity, Hubble Space Telescope transit spectroscopy, as well as detailed atmospheric characterization with JWST," astronomers said. .

As long as scientists do not observe the details of the planet, they will not be able to determine what it looks like or what its elements are. But, according to the temperature estimate, which approaches 1000 degrees Fahrenheit, researchers do not have much hope of finding signs of extraterrestrial life on the planet.