Wednesday, April 18, 2007

Water was detected at a distant planet

It was first detected water in the atmosphere planet outside the solar system. The planet, known as HD 209458b, is a gas giant like our Jupiter and is located 150 light years from Earth in the constellation Pegasus.

Other scientists said in February that they could find no evidence of water in the atmosphere of this planet, as well as on other planets such as Jupiter. Details of the study published in the Journal of astrophysics.

It was expected that the water vapor is found in the atmospheres of planets vnesolnechnyh majority, even those that orbit closest to their parent stars than Mercury orbit our sun.

For most planets outside solar system and their location close to the parent stars made the search for water and other constituents are very complex.

During the study, scientists took advantage of the fact that HD209458b when viewed from the Earth passes directly in front of its star every three and a half days. When that happens, the atmosphere of the planet blocks a different amount of stellar light at different wavelengths light waves. In particular, the presence of water in the giant planet's atmosphere makes it more special part of the infrared spectrum, as compared with lengths of waves visible spectrum.

Astronomer Travis Barman (Travis Barman) from Louella Observatory in Flagstaff, USA, found what he calls a clear indication vodopogloscheniya in an atmosphere of this planet. The findings were made using analysis of data obtained from the Hubble Space Telescope.

Barman said that his opening to believe that other planets outside our solar system have water evaporation in their atmospheres, even though it has not been proved by other scientists.

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