Using ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT), a team of astronomers have been able to detect the telltale spectral fingerprint of water molecules in the atmosphere of a planet in orbit around another star. The discovery endorses a new technique that will let astronomers efficiently search for water on hundreds of worlds without the need for space-based telescopes. Dr. Jayne Birkby of Leiden University presented the new result on Friday 5 July at the RAS National Astronomy Meeting in St. Andrews, Scotland.
Since the early 1990s scientists have found almost 1,000 planets in orbit around other stars. These so-called exoplanets are mostly much larger than the Earth and many are much closer to their stars than we are to the Sun, leading them to be described as ‘hot Jupiters’. In the new work the team studied the exoplanet HD 189733b, a world that orbits its star every 2.2 days and is heated to a temperature of over 1,000 degrees Celsius.
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