James Webb Space Telescope makes more discoveries thanks to a camera designed at the University of Arizona and key roles of local scientists.
Henry Brean NASA now knows what’s cooking on a “hot Saturn” 700 light-years from Earth, thanks to a camera designed at the University of Arizona and key contributions from local scientists.
Webb tracked WASP-39b as it passed in front of its star and used changes in the color of starlight filtering through the planet’s atmosphere to detect the presence of different chemicals. That’s exciting, said Megan Mansfield, a NASA Sagan Fellow at Steward Observatory, because sulfur dioxide is produced from chemical reactions triggered by intense light from a nearby star, much the way the protective ozone layer forms in Earth’s upper atmosphere.
Scientists relied on computer models designed by UA postdoctoral research fellow Sarah Moran to fully explain the photochemical data from WASP-39b. Improvements to such modeling could be used in the future to interpret potential signs of habitability on known exoplanets and worlds yet to be discovered.
WASP-39b is not to be confused with WASP-96b, one of the first exoplanets to be imaged by the new space telescope after it was launched on Christmas Day 2021. Also a gas giant, WASP-96b can be found in the southern-sky constellation Phoenix, about 1,500 light-years from Earth.
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