Identification of carbon dioxide in an exoplanet atmosphere

• DOI: 10.1038/s41586-022-05269-w
• Publication Date: 2022-09-02T10:05:52Z
• Authors: Eva-Maria Ahrer; Lili Alderson; Natalie M. Batalha; Natasha E. Batalha; Jacob L. Bean; Thomas G. Beatty; Taylor J. Bell; Björn Benneke; Zachory K. Berta-...; Aarynn L. Carter; Ian J. M. Crossfield; Néstor Espinoza; Adina D. Feinstein; Jonathan J. Fortney; Neale P. Gibson; Jayesh M. Goyal; Eliza M.-R. Kempton; James Kirk; Laura Kreidberg; Mercedes López-Mo...; Michael R. Line; Joshua D. Lothringer; Sarah E. Moran; Sagnick Mukherjee; Kazumasa Ohno; Vivien Parmentier; Caroline Piaulet; Zafar Rustamkulov; Everett Schlawin; David K. Sing; Kevin B. Stevenson; Hannah R. Wakeford; Natalie H. Allen; Stephan M. Birkmann; Jonathan Brande; Nicolas Crouzet; Patricio E. Cubillos; Mario Damiano; Jean-Michel Désert; Peter Gao; Joseph Harrington; Renyu Hu; Sarah Kendrew; Heather A. Knutson; Pierre-Olivier La...; Jérémy Leconte; Monika Lendl; Ryan J. MacDonald; E. M. May; Yamila Miguel; Karan Molaverdikhani; Julianne I. Moses; Catriona Anne Murray; Molly Nehring; Nikolay K. Nikolov; D. J. M. Petit di...; Michael Radica; Pierre-Alexis Roy; Keivan G. Stassun; Jake Taylor; William C. Waalkes; Patcharapol Wachi...; Luis Welbanks; Peter J. Wheatley; Keshav Aggarwal; Munazza K. Alam; Agnibha Banerjee; Joanna K. Barstow; Jasmina Blecic; S. L. Casewell; Quentin Changeat; K. L. Chubb; Knicole D. Colón; Louis-Philippe Co...; Tansu Daylan; Miguel de Val-Borro; Leen Decin; Leonardo A. Dos S...; Laura Flagg; Kevin France; Guangwei Fu; A. García Muñoz; John E. Gizis; Ana Glidden; David Grant; Kevin Heng; Thomas Henning; Yu-Cian Hong; Julie Inglis; Nicolas Iro; Tiffany Kataria; Thaddeus D. Komacek; Jessica E. Krick; Elspeth K. H. Lee; Nikole K. Lewis; Jorge Lillo-Box; Jacob Lustig-Yaeger; Luigi Mancini; Avi M. Mandell; Megan Mansfield; Mark S. Marley; Thomas Mikal-Evans; Giuseppe Morello; Matthew C. Nixon; Kevin Ortiz Ceballos; Anjali A. A. Piette; Diana Powell; Benjamin V. Rackham; Lakeisha Ramos-Ro...; Emily Rauscher; Seth Redfield; Laura K. Rogers; Michael T. Roman; Gael M. Roudier; Nicholas Scarsdale; Evgenya L. Shkolnik; John Southworth; Jessica J. Spake; Maria E. Steinrueck; Xianyu Tan; Johanna K. Teske; Pascal Tremblin; Shang-Min Tsai; Gregory S. Tucker; Jake D. Turner; Jeff A. Valenti; Olivia Venot; Ingo P. Waldmann; Nicole L. Wallack; Xi Zhang; Sebastian Zieba
• Keywords: Identification

Abstract Carbon dioxide (CO 2 ) is a key chemical species that found in wide range of planetary atmospheres. In the context exoplanets, CO an indicator metal enrichment (that is, elements heavier than helium, also called ‘metallicity’) 1–3 , and thus formation processes primary atmospheres hot gas giants 4–6 . It one most promising to detect secondary terrestrial exoplanets 7–9 Previous photometric measurements transiting planets with Spitzer Space Telescope have given hints presence but not yielded definitive detections owing lack unambiguous spectroscopic identification 10–12 Here we present detection atmosphere giant exoplanet WASP-39b from transmission spectroscopy observations obtained JWST as part Early Release Science programme 13,14 The data used this study span 3.0–5.5 micrometres wavelength show prominent absorption feature at 4.3 (26-sigma significance). overall spectrum well matched by one-dimensional, ten-times solar metallicity models assume radiative–convective–thermochemical equilibrium moderate cloud opacity. These predict should water, carbon monoxide hydrogen sulfide addition little methane. Furthermore, tentatively small near 4.0 reproduced these models.