They find a potentially habitable exoplanet close to Earth

A investigation international community has found in the constellation Pisces a planet temperate, intermediate in size and located in the potentially habitable zone of its star, about 40 light years from the Land, As reported this Thursday by the Institute of Astrophysics of the Canary Islands (IAC), archipelago Spanish Atlantic.

The planet has been named Gliese 12 and its discovery has been possible thanks to observations by NASA’s Tess satellite and facilities such as the Carmenes spectrograph at the Calar Alto Observatory (Almería) and MuSCAT2 at the telescope. Carlos Sánchez, at the Teide Observatory (Tenerife), in the Canary Islands.

Gliese 12 b lies within the habitable zone of its star, a cool red dwarf, making it “a promising candidate” to study its atmosphere with the James Webb space telescope, the IAC said in a statement.

It is the closest temperate exoplanet of similar size to Earth to date, detected with the transit method, that is, by observing the periodic dimming of its star caused by the passage of the planet.

Gliese 12 b has a diameter comparable to that of Venus, slightly smaller than that of Earth, and its surface temperature is estimated to be about 42 °C.

The final temperature will depend on whether this planet has been able to retain an atmosphere and its composition, from the time it formed to the present.

The exoplanet orbits its host star, Gliese 12, a cool red dwarf located almost 40 light-years away in the constellation of Pisces, whose size is a 27% that of the Sun and with a surface temperature 60% of the solar

The distance separating Gliese 12 from the exoplanet is “only” he 7% of the distance between the Earth and the Sun, so it receives 1.6 times more energy from its star than our planet.

“Although we still don’t know if Gliese 12 b has an atmosphere, we have been thinking of it as an exo-Venus, with a size and energy received from its star similar to those of our planetary neighbor in the sola system.r,” said Masayuji Kuzuhara, associate professor of the project at the Tokyo Astrobiology Center, who co-leads the research team that has published its results in the journal ‘The Astrophysical Journal Letters’.

Gliese 12 b represents “one of the best goals to study whether Earth-sized planets orbiting cool stars can retain their atmospheres, a crucial step to advance our understanding of habitability on planets across our entire planet.” galaxy”, said Shishir Dholakia, an astrophysicist at the University of Southern Queensland (Australia).

Shishir Dholakia is principal investigator of another team that has published its results in parallel and independently in the journal ‘Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society’.

A unique candidate for atmospheric studies

This is a candidate “unique for new atmospheric studies that could help unravel some aspects of the evolution of our own solar system“explained Enric Pallé, an IAC researcher who also participated in the discovery.

Although Earth and Venus are very similar planets in size and mass, their histories have been very different, remember: Earth is still habitable, but Venus is not due to its total loss of water.

The atmosphere of Gliese 12 b could teach a lot about how the atmospheric evolution and habitability conditions of terrestrial planets change as they evolve, adds Enric Pallé.

An important factor in retaining an atmosphere is the stormy nature of its star, the statement indicates, which also notes that red dwarfs tend to be magnetically active, leading to frequent and powerful flares of X-rays and ultraviolet radiation.

However, both teams’ analyzes conclude that Gliese 12 shows no signs of extreme behavior, making this system an ideal candidate for studying its atmosphere with the James Webb Space Telescope.

The researchers point out that, thanks to current technology, the transit method can be used to analyze the chemical composition of exoplanetary atmospheres.

By studying the unique pattern of chemical fingerprints generated when starlight passes through the planet’s gaseous shell, the molecules present can be identified and their composition better understood.

To date, only one is known “handful of transiting planets that are close enough to Earth and that meet the necessary criteria for this type of study; “Gliese 12 b, is an exceptional candidate that will help us better understand the diversity of atmospheres around temperate Earth-like planets.”Pallé concluded.

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