US EditionA Planet that Smells Like Rotten Eggs? Webb Telescope Finds a Strange New World
L 98-59 d is a low-density exoplanet with a global magma ocean and sulfur-rich atmosphere, revealing a new class of gas-rich sulfurous worlds, researchers said.
- On Monday , a University of Oxford-led team published their findings on exoplanet L 98-59 d using JWST and ground telescopes in Nature Astronomy.
- Simulations indicate a superdeep molten silicate mantle storing sulfur that released sulphur gases over nearly 5 billion years from a global magma ocean.
- Data show L 98-59 d is about 1.6 times Earth's size and very low-density, orbiting a small red star about 35 light-years away with an atmosphere containing hydrogen sulfide and sulfur dioxide.
- The discovery suggests a new class of sulfur-rich planets is needed, and researchers say it opens the door to finding more such worlds with JWST observations.
- Simulations suggest the planet likely began as a volatile-rich, larger sub-Neptune and shrank over billions of years, while its magma reservoir helped retain gases against stellar X-rays, offering insights into Earth and Mars.
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Newly Discovered Planet Could Be the Smelliest in the Universe, Astronomers Say
Astronomers have discovered a new class of exoplanet that defies traditional categories of planetary classification. In a groundbreaking study published in Nature Astronomy, researchers led by the University of Oxford reveal L 98-59 d, an alien world that features a persistent magma ocean and…
der Standard AT
der Standard DEData from the James Webb telescope indicates a sulfur-rich Magmaozean world. The observations speak for a previously overlooked planet type
A planet that smells like rotten eggs? Webb Telescope finds a strange new world
Astronomers have discovered a bizarre exoplanet slightly larger than Earth, covered by a vast magma ocean and wrapped in a sulfur‑rich atmosphere. Observations from the James Webb Space Telescope suggest the world may represent an entirely new class of planet unlike anything in our solar system.
An international team of scientists finds in the exoplanet L 98-59 d an immense reservoir of boiling sulfur beneath the surface, which defies all the planetary categories known so far
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