An international team of researchers has announced the discovery of TOI-1452 b, a water-filled exoplanet orbiting one of two small stars in a binary system located in the constellation Draco, about 100 light-years from Earth.
Brazilian astronomer José-Dias do Nascimento, UFRN representative in the study that resulted in the find, said that “discoveries like these represent an important step in understanding cosmic diversity and teach how rare vital parameters found here on Earth can be.” .
The findings of TOI-1452b, which is being called a “super-Earth” due to these characteristics, were published in the scientific journal The Astronomical Journal.
The exoplanet is slightly larger in size and mass than Earth and is located at a distance from its star, where the temperature would be neither too hot nor too cold for liquid water to exist on the surface.
The team of astronomers believe it could be an “oceanic planet”, completely covered in a layer of water, similar to some of the moons of Jupiter and Saturn.
“TOI-1452b is still a unique system when studying exoplanets in the transition between super-Earths and mini-Neptunes”, he explains.
According to José-Dias, this planet outside our Solar System “is already considered one of the main targets for future atmospheric characterization with the James Webb telescope and for analysis through transmission spectroscopy”.
The discovery was made using data from SPIRou, a new worlds hunter instrument that uses infrared light from the Canada – France – Hawaii Telescope (CFHT), installed on the summit of Maunakea Mountain, in Hawaii (USA).
“This is an important discovery for our group at UFRN, as, in just under three years, we are announcing the fourth exoplanet with our participation.”
The previous exoplanet was TOI-257b, which is an example of what we call ‘sub-Saturns’, planets larger than Neptune and smaller than Saturn.
“Now we are revealing a super-Earth. These planets are absent in the architecture of our Solar System, although possible,” said José-Dias.
Source: CNN Brasil
