NASA says exoplanet K2-18 b could be a “Hycean” planet, as the Webb telescope helped detect methane and carbon dioxide there, though it is unclear if it could support life.
Still, they described the new revelations as a gateway to more insight on planets beyond Earth.
NASA said the prospect that K2-18 b could be a “Hycean” exoplanet, or an ocean world, was “intriguing,” as some astronomers believe such planets are promising environments to search for evidence of life on exoplanets. “Our findings underscore the importance of considering diverse habitable environments in the search for life elsewhere,” said astrophysicist Nikku Madhusudhan of Cambridge’s Institute of Astronomy, the lead author of the study.
K2-18 b, more than twice as large as Earth, was discovered in 2015 sitting in its star’s “habitable zone,” a range that is neither too hot nor too cold to host liquid water., but the technology of its successor, the Webb telescope, including extended wavelength range and “unprecedented sensitivity,” have made the latest detections possible, Madhusudhan said.
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