Robert Lea is a science journalist in the U.K. whose articles have been published in Physics World, New Scientist, Astronomy Magazine, All About Space, Newsweek and ZME Science. He also writes about science communication for Elsevier and the European Journal of Physics. Rob holds a bachelor of science degree in physics and astronomy from the U.K.
There are many words that could be used to describe WASP-76b — hellish, scorching, turbulent, chaotic, and even violent. This is a planet outside the solar system that sits so close to its star it gets hot enough to vaporize lead. So, as you can imagine, until now,"glorious" wasn't one of those words.
As the dayside of WASP-76b is blasted by radiation from its host star, temperatures there soar in excess of 4,350 degrees Fahrenheit . That's hot enough to vaporize iron. Strong and fast winds on WASP-76b then carry this iron vapor to the cooler, night side of the planet, where it condenses into droplets and falls as iron rain.The hint of the glory effect over this blistering exoplanet is a remarkable achievement for CHEOPS, which launched in December 2019.
"What's important to keep in mind is the incredible scale of what we're witnessing," Matthew Standing, an ESA Research Fellow studying exoplanets, said in the statement."WASP-76b is several hundred light-years away — an intensely hot gas giant planet where it likely rains molten iron. As the light waves split and then reunite, where peaks meet troughs, there is destructive interference. But, where a peak meets a peak, there is constructive interference. This results in dark and light bands, respectively, and concentric rings of color.
For Demangeon, this potential observation validates this continued interest in investigating the hellish world of Wasp-76b.
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