New Method to Detect Oxygen on Exoplanets

In an exoplanet’s atmosphere, one possible indication of life or biosignature is the presence of oxygen. When organisms such as plants, algae, and cyanobacteria use photosynthesis to convert sunlight into chemical energy the oxygen is generated by life on Earth. To detect a strong signal that oxygen molecules produce when they collide, UC Riverside helped develop the new technique that uses NASA’S James Webb Space Telescope. Scientists can distinguish between living and non-living with the help of this signal.
Scientists cannot look for signs of life by visiting these exoplanets as they are orbit stars other than our sun, and is so far away. In order to see what’s inside the atmospheres of exoplanets, they must use a cutting-edge telescope like that of Webb. With Webb, oxygen at similar levels as on Earth was thought to be undetectable. Since the early 1980s, this oxygen signal has been known from Earth’s atmospheric studies but has never been studied for exoplanet research. Interestingly, according to some researchers oxygen can also make an exoplanet appear to host life when it does not, because it can accumulate in a planet’s atmosphere without any activity of life. The atmosphere becomes very warm and saturated with water vapor from evaporating oceans because if an exoplanet is too close to its host star or receives too much starlight. With time, this water vapor may cause entire oceans to be lost while building up a thick oxygen atmosphere.
Webb is going to be the world’s premier space science observatory when it launches in 2021 which is going to allow scientists to solve mysteries in our solar system.

By: Soumya Jha
Content: www.chronicle.gi