Space: discovery of the first rocky exoplanet atmosphere on Cancri 55th
Mathilde Fontez, editor-in-chief of the scientific magazine Epsiloon, tells us about this discovery published in the scientific journal Nature: the first detection of the atmosphere of a rocky exoplanet.
franceinfo: Is Cancri 55 e a planet like Earth, but outside our solar system?
Mathilde Fontez: Yes, it’s a very, very distant planet. It is located 41 light years from Earth. So it’s impossible to go there. But we see it with telescopes. It’s called Cancri 55th and it was discovered in 2004.
In 2022 and 2023, it was targeted by the powerful James Webb Space Telescope. The analysis of these results has just been published. For the first time, we seem to detect an atmosphere around a rocky exoplanet, like Earth.
When were exoplanets first discovered?
The first was discovered in 1995. There are more than 5,000 of them. There are exoplanets everywhere, around almost every star. By studying their eclipses, the way they filter light when they pass in front of their star, astrophysicists have already succeeded in analyzing the atmospheres of the largest of them, the gas giants. But until then, we had never been able to see a rocky planet atmosphere.
- For more: Elrisala website and for social follow us on Facebook
- Source of information and images “francetvinfo“
