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| The atmosphere of the distant “warm Neptune” HAT-P-26b, illustrated here, is unexpectedly primitive, composed primarily of hydrogen and helium. By combining observations from NASA’s Hubble and Spitzer space telescopes, researchers determined that, unlike Neptune and Uranus, the exoplanet has relatively low metallicity, an indication of the how rich the planet is in all elements heavier than hydrogen and helium. |
A new study of a Neptune-size world has revealed a surprisingly “primitive atmosphere” composed almost entirely of hydrogen and helium, with water vapor and possible clouds. Scientists say this finding could provide an important breakthrough in understanding how planets form, and how atmospheres can vary between exoplanets with different masses.
“Astronomers have just begun to investigate the atmospheres of these distant Neptune-mass planets, and almost right away we found an example that goes against the trend in our solar system,” said Hannah Wakeford from NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center. “This kind of unexpected result is why I really love exploring the atmospheres of alien planets.”
Wakeford, along with David Sing from the University of Exeter and a team of other researchers, looked at the exoplanet HAT-P-26b, which was discovered in 2010 and is located about 430 light years from Earth. It is a “warm” world that orbits relatively close to its star, circling it every 4.23 days.
Using observations from the Hubble Space Telescope and the Spitzer Space Telescope, the researchers found strong indications of water as well as a possible cloud layer with a unique makeup in the atmosphere of HAT-P-26b.
“What we have detected is a strong water absorption feature with some evidence of a cloud layer deep in the atmosphere at the base altitude of the measurements we have made,” Wakeford told Seeker. “This cloud would not be made of water due to the high temperature of the atmosphere but would instead be more exotic and composed most likely of Na2S (di-sodium sulfide). At the altitudes we probed with these observations and the strong water vapor absorption signature, this is a relatively cloudless portion of the atmosphere.”
Measuring the abundance of atmospheric water provides information about the proportion of elements in the atmosphere that are heavier than hydrogen and helium, a value astronomers refer to as the metallicity. Surprisingly, it was lower than expected, only about 4.8 times that of the Sun — less than that of Neptune and Uranus, for example, and closer to the value for Jupiter.
“HAT-P-26b is the first to buck the trend seen with our solar system and other exoplanets, which suggest that lower mass planets have higher metallicities,” Wakeford said via email. “As the first to buck this trend, HAT-P-26b will be an important marker in our understanding of planetary formation scenarios.”
When a distant planet transits, or passes in front its host star, starlight gets filtered through the planet’s atmosphere. Using a spectrometer, astronomers can measure the light to see what elements are present in the planet’s atmosphere.
“This is the strongest water absorption feature that has measured for an exoplanet of this size,” Wakeford said. “Additionally, what is most important is that we have been able to use this detection to approximate the overall metallicity of the atmosphere based on the water abundance, and compared to similar sized planets in our solar system we find that HAT-P-26b has a much lower metallicity.”
This suggests that it formed differently — perhaps closer to the star or late in the lifetime of the disk around the star — compared to Neptune.
In our own solar system, the metallicity in Jupiter, which is five times greater than the Sun, and Saturn (10 times), suggest that these “gas giants” are made almost entirely of hydrogen and helium. Neptune and Uranus, however, are richer in the heavier elements, with metallicities of about 100 times that of the sun.
Read more at Discovery News
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