Latest news with #AnneMarieLagrange
The National
a day ago
- Science
- The National
James Webb Space Telescope's first 'alien world' discovery unlocks new era of planet-hunting
Scientists have unveiled groundbreaking direct images of a planet outside of our own solar system, taken by the James Webb Space Telescope. It is the first exoplanet discovered by the telescope, proving it can detect lighter and more elusive worlds orbiting distant stars. The planet, named TWA 7b, is situated near a young star about 34 lightyears away, in the constellation Hydra. It is the lightest exoplanet ever seen through direct imaging, with a mass similar to Saturn and about one-third that of Jupiter, as scientists are now able to study smaller, cooler planets that are more difficult to detect. The findings were published in the Nature science journal on Wednesday. Dr Anne-Marie Lagrange, a researcher with the French National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS), led the study by an international team. 'Our observations reveal a strong candidate for a planet shaping the structure of the TWA 7 debris disc, and its position is exactly where we expected to find a planet of this mass,' she said. How the planet was found While thousands of exoplanets have been found over the past three decades, most have been detected through indirect methods. These included measuring the dimming of a star as a planet passes in front of it or by watching for tiny movements in a star caused by the gravitational pull of an orbiting planet. Only some have ever been directly imaged, and those have typically been enormous gas giants. TWA 7b was spotted using a powerful coronagraph installed on Webb's Mid-Infrared Instrument (Miri), a telescope attachment developed the CNRS and the French Alternative Energies and Atomic Energy Commission. The coronagraph acted like a solar eclipse, blocking out the light of a star so that the much fainter objects orbiting nearby could be seen. This technique helped astronomers spot a faint source of light hidden inside one of the thin dust rings surrounding the star TWA 7. After ruling out objects such as background galaxies or image glitches, scientists realised the signal was coming from a planet, one that had never been seen before. Computer simulations showed that the planet was placed exactly where there is a strange gap in the star's narrow dust ring, which meant strong evidence that its gravity is shaping the ring's structure. Building on past space telescope discoveries Since the telescope's science operations started in 2022, it has helped scientists make several discoveries. These included helping to confirm the chemical composition of atmospheres of other planets and extreme weather patterns on gas giants. JWST's predecessor, the Hubble Space Telescope, also made valuable discoveries in the early era of direct imaging. It captured the first visible-light image of an exoplanetary system in 2008, however, it lacked the sensitivity to see planets smaller than Jupiter. Now, the James Webb Space Telescope is now offering more advanced techniques. 'This observatory enables us to capture images of planets with masses similar to those in the solar system, which represents an exciting step forward in our understanding of planetary systems, including our own,' said Mathilde Malin, co-author of the study. What comes next The team behind the discovery thinks Webb could soon be able to spot planets with just 10 per cent the mass of Jupiter, getting close to the size of Neptune and 'super-Earths', planets outside the solar system that are larger than Earth but smaller than icy planets like Neptune and Uranus. TWA 7 b also gives scientists a roadmap for how future space and ground-based telescopes that might detect even smaller, more Earth-like planets.
CBS News
2 days ago
- Science
- CBS News
NASA's James Webb Space Telescope captures images of what's believed to be newly discovered exoplanet
NASA's James Webb Space Telescope has captured evidence of a planet beyond the solar system for the first time since its launch in 2021. The exoplanet, a planet beyond our solar system, has been dubbed TWA 7b and orbits the young nearby star TWA 7, NASA said. Scientists believe the exoplanet is around the mass of Saturn and is about 50 times the distance of Earth from the Sun, according to NASA. Usually, planets of this size outside of our solar system are difficult to detect, but scientists used a technique called high-contrast imaging to detect the exoplanet, NASA said. Images of the exoplanet were taken using a coronagraph, which allows researchers to suppress the bright glare of a star to reveal faint nearby objects. Astronomers using the James Webb Space Telescope have captured compelling evidence of a planet with a mass similar to Saturn orbiting the young nearby star TWA 7. Space Telescope Science Institute Scientists said there was a very small chance the images could show a background galaxy, but evidence "strongly points to the source being a previously undiscovered planet." "Our observations reveal a strong candidate for a planet shaping the structure of the TWA 7 debris disk, and its position is exactly where we expected to find a planet of this mass," said lead researcher Anne-Marie Lagrange. The exoplanet could be a young and cold planet with a mass around 0.3 times that of Jupiter and a temperature near 120 degrees Fahrenheit, according to initial analysis from researchers. The first time scientists discovered an exoplanet was back in 1992. Astronomers have discovered nearly 6,000 exoplanets since then, but none of them are known to be habitable.
Malay Mail
3 days ago
- Science
- Malay Mail
James Webb spots its first new exoplanet, a young Saturn-like world 100 light years away
PARIS, June 26 — The James Webb Space Telescope has discovered its first exoplanet, astronomers said Wednesday, capturing rare direct images of the relatively small world in the Earth's galactic backyard. The telescope, which can see farther into the universe than anything before it, has turbocharged the search for planets beyond the Solar System since coming online in 2022. Until now, however, its deep gaze has mostly been used to probe already known exoplanets — to find out key information such as the atmospheric composition — rather than tracking down new worlds. The discovery of exoplanet TWA 7b, revealed in a study in the journal Nature, 'represents a first for the telescope', France's CNRS research centre said in a statement. The large majority of the nearly 6,000 exoplanets found so far have been identified from the light they blot out when they pass in front of their star, rather than from direct images of the planet. Webb 'has spent an enormous amount of time observing planets that have never been directly imaged,' lead study author Anne-Marie Lagrange of the Paris Observatory told AFP. 'Blinded by the light' Capturing direct images of faraway planets is difficult because they are 'very faint' due to a lack of heat, Lagrange said. Even worse, she added, 'we're blinded by the light of the star they orbit.' But Webb has a way to get around the problem. An attachment to Webb's MIRI instrument called a coronagraph masks the star, creating an effect similar to a solar eclipse. The telescope's infrared vision can then peer through and spot the planet. Astronomers pointed Webb at the star TWA 7, which is around a hundred light years from Earth — relatively nearby in the universe. The star, which was first spotted by the Hubble space telescope in 1999, was thought to be a promising target for two reasons. It is just 6.4 million years old — a baby compared to the Sun's 4.5 billion years — and still surrounded by a massive disc of gas and dust where planets are thought to form. And from the direction of Earth, the disc is seen from above, giving a good view of its rings. The three rings around the star, which stretch more than 100 times the distance separating the Sun and Earth, had previously been spotted by the Very Large Telescope in Chile. But inside an otherwise empty section of the second ring, the Webb telescope detected something particularly bright. Astronomers ruled out that the light was coming from an object at the edge of the Solar System, or from a distant galaxy behind the star. That could mean only that the light source was a relatively small and cold planet, with a mass at least 10 times lighter than any other exoplanet directly imaged so far, according to the study. The hunt for smaller worlds The researchers estimated that the planet's mass was similar to that of Saturn, a gas giant that weighs only a third of Jupiter, the biggest planet in the Solar System. Webb has increased the ability to detect exoplanets via direct images by a factor of 10, Lagrange said. That is important because smaller, rocky planets similar to Earth or Mars are the ultimate target in the search for habitable worlds outside of the Solar System. Lagrange said she would be delighted to discover 'Earth-like planets' one day. But she said astronomers needed to study all kinds of planets — and to understand how planetary systems form — to know whether the life-hosting Solar System is unique. In the future, astronomers expect the Webb telescope will be able to spot planets even smaller than TWA 7b. But directly capturing images of faraway worlds similar to Earth will require even more telescopic power, such as from he Extremely Large Telescope that is scheduled to come online in Chile in 2028. — AFP
Yahoo
3 days ago
- Science
- Yahoo
James Webb telescope discovers its first planet — a Saturn-size 'shepherd' still glowing red hot from its formation
When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission. The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) has captured its first direct image of a planet in a remote solar system, and it's lighter than any seen before. The planet, named TWA 7b, is a gas giant with a size comparable to Saturn's. Orbiting a star just over 6 million years old, the planet is still glowing hot from its formation. The planet is the first observation of hypothesized yet previously unseen "shepherd" planets, which clear gaps of material found inside planetary rings. The researchers behind the discovery published their findings June 25 in the journal Nature. "It tells us that indeed, planets can form gaps in disks (which was theorised, but not observed) and trojan-like structures can indeed be present in exoplanetary systems," lead study author Anne-Marie Lagrange, an astronomer and research director at the French National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS) in Paris, told Live Science. "It is the first time that such a light planet is imaged, ten times lighter than the lightest [previously known] planet," she said. "This is thanks to the extreme sensitivity of JWST in the thermal domain." Astronomers study exoplanets because they help them to understand how planetary systems, such as our own, form. Yet while thousands have been seen indirectly — through the dimming of host stars as they pass in front of them or the wobble the planets' gravitational tugs give them — the light bouncing off exoplanets is usually drowned out by the light from the star, making them effectively invisible. Related: 'Eyeball' planet spied by James Webb telescope might be habitable To peer through this glare, JWST uses a coronagraph attached to its Mid-Infrared Instrument (MIRI); this device blocks out a star's light and makes it easier to spot objects orbiting around it. To further boost the effectiveness of this search, astronomers select young stars whose planetary disks are pole-on to the telescope, enabling them to 'look down' over star systems whose satellites are still glowing hot from their formation. RELATED STORIES —James Webb telescope spots wind blowing faster than a bullet on '2-faced planet' with eternal night —James Webb telescope discovers oldest black hole in the universe —James Webb telescope finds origins of the biggest explosion since the Big Bang — revealing a new cosmological mystery The system containing TWA 7b, called TWA 7, is 110 light-years from Earth and contains three concentric rings of rocky debris and dust, one of which was narrow and flanked by two empty bands of space. Within the heart of this narrow ring, the scientists found a hole containing a source of infrared-radiation. Follow-up simulations suggested that this radiation source is a planet roughly 30% the size of Jupiter that's orbiting its star at 52 times the distance that Earth orbits the sun. Its presence in a gap inside the planetary ring is also intriguing; while observations of holes in the discs surrounding stars have been made before in other systems, this is the first clear detection of the shepherd planets believed to create them. To further investigate the new system and others like it, Lagrange said that she and her colleagues will obtain "more data to study TWA7 b atmosphere, to search for other light, cold young planets in imaging" and "to search for cold old massive planets."
Gizmodo
3 days ago
- Science
- Gizmodo
Webb Telescope Just Did Something It's Never Done Before—and Astronomers Are Thrilled
Since it began its science operations in July 2022, the James Webb Space Telescope has been probing the atmospheres of alien planets to study their potential for habitability. For the first time, however, Webb has discovered its own exoplanet, finding a young system hidden in a swirling cloud of dust and debris. Webb has captured a previously unseen exoplanet, the lightest planet imaged so far—an accomplishment made possible by the space-based telescope's advanced capabilities. The recent discovery, detailed in a paper published Wednesday in the journal Nature, marks Webb's first discovery of an exoplanet and opens up a new window into hidden, Saturn-like worlds. 'The planets are much fainter by orders of magnitudes than their parent stars, and seen from Earth or from JWST, they are angularly very close to them,' Anne-Marie Lagrange, research director at the French National Center for Scientific Research and lead author of the paper, told Gizmodo. 'Hence, when looking at a planet we see only the star.' In order to overcome this issue, the team behind the new discovery used a coronagraph—a telescopic attachment for Webb's Mid-Infrared Instrument. The coronagraph recreates the effect of a solar eclipse, blocking the light from a star to make its surroundings more visible. Using the coronagraph, the scientists spotted a young planetary system that's only a few million years old. The system, named TWA 7, has three distinct rings, one of which is especially narrow while being surrounded by two areas that hold almost no matter. In Webb's image, something lies within the heart of the narrow ring, which the scientists behind the study concluded is an exoplanet. The newly discovered exoplanet, dubbed TWA 7b, is more massive than Neptune but around 30% less massive than Jupiter, the largest planet of our solar system. TWA 7b, designated a sub-Jupiter, has a mass similar to that of Saturn's and orbits around a star that formed approximately 6.4 million years ago. The planet maintains a large distance of 52 astronomical units (in which 1 au is the average distance between the Earth and the Sun) from its star. 'It is also the first planet explaining gaps in a disk,' Lagrange said. 'It is unique to explain disk-planet interactions during the early phases of planetary systems.' Planets form from the material leftover from the birth of a star, which create a swirling disk of matter. Previous observations of these protoplanetary disks has revealed ring-like structures and gaps, which were believed to be signatures of unseen planets. So far, there were no direct observations of those planets. The mass and orbital features of TWA 7b, however, match the predicted properties of an exoplanet that may have formed in the gap between the first and second ring of the disk. By using Webb to observe young, faint planets, scientists have unlocked a new doorway into the discovery of alien worlds. 'In terms of imaging, it opens the possibility to image Saturn-like planets. In further steps, it will allow us to characterize the atmosphere of Saturn-like, non irradiated planets,' Lagrange said. 'It is a big step. It helps us knowing what is complicated when searching for very light planets.'
