James Webb telescope finds water vapour in distant planet-forming zone
The James Webb Space Telescope has detected water vapour in the inner disk of the planetary system PDS 70, located 370 light-years away, Nasa announced Monday (24 July).
This is the first time that water vapour has been detected in this region of a planet-forming disk, and it suggests that there may be water available for rocky planets to form.
"This discovery is extremely exciting, as it probes the region where rocky planets similar to Earth typically form," said lead author Giulia Perotti of the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy (MPIA) in Heidelberg, Germany.
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The water vapour was detected by the James Webb Telescope's Mid-Infrared Instrument (MIRI).
"We've seen water in other disks, but not so close in and in a system where planets are currently assembling. We couldn't make this type of measurement before Webb," Giulia added.
Water is essential for life as we know it, so this discovery could have implications for the search for life beyond Earth; it can also give us insight into how water came to be on Earth.
PDS 70 is a K-type star, cooler than our Sun, and is estimated to be 5.4 million years old. This is relatively old in terms of stars with planet-forming disks, which made the discovery of water vapour surprising.
"We find a relatively high amount of small dust grains. Combined with our detection of water vapour, the inner disk is a very exciting place," said co-author Rens Waters of Radboud University in The Netherlands.
In order to gain a better understanding of the PDS 70 system, the team will use two more of Webb's instruments, NIRCam and NIRSpec.
The James Webb Space Telescope is the most powerful telescope ever built. It was launched in December 2021, and it is currently studying the earliest stars and galaxies in the universe, as well as exoplanets.
