When he started in 2022 James Webb Space Telescope (Jwst) their scientific activity, astronomers were eagerly waiting for the moment they would focus on their eyes on the famous system TRAPPIST-1. Around this red dwarf, about 40 light -years away, seven planets circle the sizes of similar Earth. Jwst’s latest goal has become TRAPPIST-1e – The planet in a habitable zone where theoretically could be conditions for the existence of liquid water.
JWST analyzes the atmosphere of exoplanet using infrared spectroscopy: when the planet passes in front of its star, part of the light passes through its external atmosphere and carries a chemical track. Thanks to the 6.5 -meter mirror, JWst can capture even weak molecules that are key to the atmosphere – water vapor, carbon dioxide, methane or ammonia.
Greenhouse gas search
The first four observed transit indicates that Trappist-1e apparently lost its original atmosphere, blowing intense star wind and eruption of the mother star. Nevertheless, it cannot be ruled out that the planet has gained a secondary atmosphere – similar to the Earth, whose envelope consisting of a mixture of nitrogen, oxygen and trace gases is a product of geological processes and biological evolution and not a residual packaging from the time of the solar system.
The data do not yet indicate a thick envelope of carbon dioxide like Venus. According to previous findings, the exoplanet is not similar to any solar system, although the models are working with the possibility of methane presence in combination with nitrogen.
They consider the question of the key scientists Whether in the atmosphere of Trappist-1e is enough carbon dioxide for the formation of a greenhouse effect that could keep water on the surface. Even a small amount of carbon dioxide could play a big role.
Hope still lives
Unfortunately, observations are complicated by the fact that the red dwarf of TRAPPIST-1 is extremely active-frequent eruptions “pollute” light spectra and make it difficult to read signals from the atmosphere of the planet. Scientists therefore came up with a smart trick: because the planet TRAPPIST-1b It passes in front of the star just before the TRAPPIST-1E, and it seems to be just a bare world without an atmosphere, its spectrum can be used as a calibration sample and better to distinguish what actually comes from TRAPPIST-1.
The four observations so far have not yet been able to confirm or refute the existence of the atmosphere, but brought a lot of valuable information. In the coming years, the TRAPPIST-1 is another 15 other measurements and astronomers believe that they will bring answers to the most important questions.
