Artists impression of GJ 3470b and its host star. Credit: NAOJ
Posted on 11/26/2015 10:09:42 PM PST by SunkenCiv
A team of astronomers have used the LCOGT network to detect light scattered by tiny particles (called Rayleigh scattering), through the atmosphere of a Neptune-size transiting exoplanet. This suggests a blue sky on this world which is only 100 light years away from us. The result was published in the Astrophysical Journal on November 20 (and is available on ArXiV).
Transits occur when an exoplanet passes in front of its parent star, reducing the amount of light we receive from the star by a small fraction. When the orbit of an exoplanet is aligned just right for transits to occur, astronomers can measure the planet's size at different wavelengths in order to generate a spectrum of its atmosphere. The spectrum then reveals the substances present in the planet's atmosphere, and therefore its composition. This measurement is most often performed using infrared light, where the planet is brightest and most easily observed. During the last few years, researchers have been probing the atmospheres of several small exoplanets with large ground and space-based telescopes, but have found it challenging to determine their composition using this method. This is either because the planets have clouds (which obscure the atmosphere) or because the measurements were not sufficiently precise.
At four times the size of the Earth, GJ 3470b is a transiting exoplanet closer in size to our own planet than to the hot Jupiters (about 10 times the size of the Earth) which so far make up the majority of exoplanets with well-characterized atmospheres. Astronomers led by Diana Dragomir... acquired and combined transit observations from all of LCOGT's observatory sites (Hawaii, Texas, Chile, Australia and South Africa) to conclusively confirm the detection of Rayleigh scattering for GJ 3470b.
(Excerpt) Read more at phys.org ...
Artists impression of GJ 3470b and its host star. Credit: NAOJ
Thanks Red Badger.
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Is that the Enterprise in the background :)
No,it’s a Bob’s Big Boy,with Dr.Evil inside.
lol
If all you had to keep you company was a red dwarf, you would be blue too.
Forgive me my Thanksgiving Day silliness, but that image looks like a sun sized (blue nippled) breast that lights from within.
Yeah, it’s been a long time for me, too. ;’)
A moon around such a planet may be very habitable!
The gas giant would provide protection from soalr flares and a it’s orbit would be around a day~week in length giving the moon a proper day/night cycle!
I'd like something a little closer, but it is very encouraging! :')
OK, when do we go?
ONLY 100 light years ... lol!!
STAND UP FOR CHUCK!!! .....oh my goodness... (Binden)
Just for today. :’) 115 years ago, the same could be said for heavier than air flight. 45 years ago, the same could be said for home computing. Just before that humans visited the Moon multiple times, and NASA had less computing power available to it than is available in many a smart phone. We don’t know what isn’t possible, only what isn’t possible right now.
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