Planet Where It Rains Sand Revealed By Nasa Telescope (theguardian.com) 22
Nasa's James Webb space telescope has revealed a planet where specks of sand fall as rain, in groundbreaking observations. From a report: The planet, Wasp-107b, lies 200 light years away in the Virgo constellation and had already caught the attention of astronomers because it is very large but very light, earning it the nickname the "candy floss" planet. The latest observations give an unprecedented glimpse of a strange and exotic world beyond our solar system that features silicate sand clouds and rain, scorching temperatures, raging winds and the distinct burnt-matches scent of sulphur dioxide. "Our knowledge of other planets is based on what we know from Earth," said Prof Leen Decin, of the Catholic Institute (KU) Leuven and first author of the research. "That's a very restricted knowledge."
The planet was discovered in 2017 after astronomers spotted a telltale periodic flickering of light from its host star each time the planet passed in front of it. "It's like a fly in front of a street lamp," said Decin. "You see a slight dimming of the light." James Webb takes these observations to the next level by measuring starlight that is filtered through the planet's atmosphere. Because different elements absorb different wavelengths of light, the spectrum of starlight indicates which gases are present. Wasp-107b is similar in mass to Neptune but almost the size of Jupiter, and its vast, diffuse nature allows the James Webb telescope to peer deep into its atmosphere.
The planet was discovered in 2017 after astronomers spotted a telltale periodic flickering of light from its host star each time the planet passed in front of it. "It's like a fly in front of a street lamp," said Decin. "You see a slight dimming of the light." James Webb takes these observations to the next level by measuring starlight that is filtered through the planet's atmosphere. Because different elements absorb different wavelengths of light, the spectrum of starlight indicates which gases are present. Wasp-107b is similar in mass to Neptune but almost the size of Jupiter, and its vast, diffuse nature allows the James Webb telescope to peer deep into its atmosphere.
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I don't like sand. It's coarse and rough and irritating and it gets everywhere. Not like here. Here everything is soft and smooth.
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Be cool (Score:2)
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Re:Be cool (Score:5, Interesting)
It sounds like a setting for a Hal Clement story. After getting his undergraduate degree in Astronomy he went off to fly bombers in WW2, and returned to become a high school science teacher and went on to get advanced degrees in education and chemistry. A lot of his stories featured exotic planet environments, in which he would work out in painstaking and scientifically acurate detail what it would be like to live or work there.
I think his most famous work is Mission of Gravity, which takes place on a planet with an eighteen minute sidereal day, but one of my favorites is an early story of his in which he imagines an animal which "sees" with its nose, and then from that figures out what kind of planet such an animal would evolve on.
Headline is absurd. (Score:2)
But there's no way it can see grains of sand, 200 light years away. We're *hundreds* of years away from being able to build a telescope that can do that, if it's even physically possible.
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The mixture of elements, is a pretty good bet. We've got lots of experience with spectral absorption lines here in our own system and have a pretty good handle on how that works.
Getting from there to "it rains san
Re:Headline is absurd. (Score:5, Informative)
"it rains sand" is somewhat more speculative,
It's speculative in the sense it was not observed, but if the planet has sand and an atmosphere, it's probably going to rain sand the the same way as on earth through sirocco https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org] Satellite pictures for Saharan dust rain in UK https://www.bbc.co.uk/newsroun... [bbc.co.uk] , and city pictures across Europe https://www.bbc.co.uk/newsroun... [bbc.co.uk]
Re:Headline is absurd. Photo is worse (Score:4, Insightful)
There are too many people who will read it was observed by the JWST and think that's what was observed.
https://www.wbur.org/npr/12131... [wbur.org]
At least it rains diamonds on Venus (Score:2)
Wasp-107b can be safely ignored.
It rains sand on earth too! (Score:2)
In Utah there's a mountain with strong west winds blowing on the mountain during storms. The mountain in primarily sedimentary rock. Sand is picked up and blown over the mountain. The ski resort on the other side gets this raining sand mixed with snow. They have night skiing and it is common to see sparks shoot out from the steel ski edges from this sand.
I know it's not a foreign planet that is hostile to any form of life, but it does rain sand. Sandstorms can rain sand too! We have lots of those, but
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I know it's not a foreign planet that is hostile to any form of life, ...
Actually, some people think that's a perfect description of Utah.
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In Utah there's a mountain with strong west winds blowing on the mountain during storms. The mountain in primarily sedimentary rock. Sand is picked up and blown over the mountain. The ski resort on the other side gets this raining sand mixed with snow. They have night skiing and it is common to see sparks shoot out from the steel ski edges from this sand.
Very cool, but not the same. The sand here goes through a cycle like the water cycle on Earth. The silicate actually turns to vapor, condenses into clouds and then rains down. I really hope that doesn't happen in Utah.
Oblig... (Score:2)