Burning Down to Rock.

• Autores: Charles Choi
• Localización: Scientific American, ISSN 0036-8733, Vol. 290, Nº. 5, 2004, págs. 22-24
• Idioma: inglés
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• Resumen

  • This article discusses what happens to the atmospheres of planet types called hot Jupiters. The first rocky worlds astronomers detect circling other stars could resemble Inferno more than Earth. At roughly 220 times Earth's mass, Osiris boasts a gravitational pull strong enough to hold its atmosphere until its star dies. But the researchers speculate the hellish rate of evaporation might completely scour all gas off smaller hot Jupiters or those closer to their stars than Osiris. The European Southern Observatory telescope in Chile has an outside chance of finding them next year: a new instrument there could detect planets as low as about 15 times Earth's mass by looking for the gravitational tugs each has on its star. The best chance to spot chthonians will come from the first space probes sensitive enough to see Earth-size planets: the French satellite COROT, scheduled for launch in 2006, and NASA's Kepler, around 2007.