James Webb Space Telescope Discovers Water Vapor on Faraway Planet

James Webb Space Telescope's information will be used to make inferences about the overall make-up of the planet, as well as how, when, and where it formed.

NASA's James Webb Space Telescope has identified water in the atmosphere of a hot, puffy gas giant planet orbiting a sun-like star over a thousand light years away, the US space agency announced today. According to NASA, the observation is the most precise of its kind to date, proving Webb's unmatched ability to analyze distant atmospheres.

WASP-96 b is one of the Milky Way's more than 5,000 known exoplanets. WASP-96 b's spectrum is not only the most detailed near-infrared transmission spectra of an exoplanet atmosphere yet acquired, but it also covers a surprisingly wide range of wavelengths, including visible red light. This region of the spectrum is especially sensitive to water, as well as other important chemicals such as oxygen, methane, and carbon dioxide.

Researchers will be able to utilize the spectrum to estimate the temperature of the atmosphere with depth, measure the amount of water vapor in the atmosphere, constrain the abundance of specific elements such as carbon and oxygen, and measure the amount of water vapor in the atmosphere. They can then use this knowledge to extrapolate the planet's overall composition as well as how, when, and where it originated.