Giant gas planet holds water in clouds

The astronomers' new findings point to a giant group of gas extraterrestrials outside the solar system covered by water-storing clouds.

According to UPI, extrasolar planets named hot Jupiter are not as arid as previously analyzed. Data from the Hubble Space Telescope and Spitzer point out that water can be hidden in thick clouds surrounding giant gas-like planets, but hotter. The findings were published yesterday in the journal Nature.

Planetary gas giant group is called hot Jupiter.(Photo: ESA / Hubble / NASA).

Researching the signs of scattered solar energy as planets pass through the parent star is not an easy task. But by combining observations from the Hubble and Spitzer lenses, astronomers can better understand each planet outside the solar system and their atmosphere.

"I was really thrilled to see this group of planets, because for the first time we have enough wavelength information to be able to compare the different features between planets. We detected the atmosphere. Their books are much richer than expected , " said David Sing, an astronomer at the University of Exeter, England.

Sing and colleagues found a correlation between planets and clouds. While cloudless planets show evidence of water, planets that do not show signs of water often have a foggy atmosphere.

"In other words, planets formed in the environment are dehydrated . This forces us to completely review the current hypothesis about how the planet was born. Our research results reject the hypothesis about The environment is dry, and shows clouds that hide water from view, " said Jonathan Fortney, a scientist at the University of California, Santa Cruz, USA.