Water is an essential component for the creation of life; as a result, scientists often look for water particles to research about the presence of life sources. In a recent development, a new study revealed that water is very common on the planet outside the solar system, exoplanets.
Recently, a research unit from the Cambridge University studied multiple features of 19 exoplanets. To everyone’s surprise, they found water vapour in 14 of the 19 exoplanets. But, they found a meagre amount of water, and far below their expectation, a release from the university revealed. In the rest of the planets, scientists discovered an excessive amount of sodium and potassium.
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More about the Study on Water Vapour on Exoplanet
Nikku Madhusudhan, the project leader of the study, claimed that chemical composition is entirely different in each of the exoplanets. In 2014, Nikku, for the first time, measured the water vapour in the exoplanets. The research team took a wide variety of samples for the study. They considered exoplanets of different sizes. They studied mini-Neptunes, which is around ten times bigger than that of the earth and planets like super-Jupiters, having 600 times the mass of the earth. They took different planets having a different temperature range before the study. They studied multiple planets having a temperature range from 20 degrees Celsius to 2,000 degrees Celsius.
The discovery of water vapour from multiple planets, revolving around multiple stars, is truly incredible, Nikku Madhusudhan revealed. One of the researchers in the study, Luis Welbanks, termed the chemical measurements in different exoplanets as a breakthrough. Humans still unable to locate water vapour in our nearer planets, such as Saturn and Jupiter, so this measurement in the exoplanets is remarkable, he further added.
Scientists discovered the presence of the water in a planet called K2-18b, often called as super-Earth, located around 110 light-years away from our home planet in September. Scientists also find the presence of water on Mars in liquid form.
