An artist’s impression showing K2-18b as a potentially habitable ocean world may not be correct NASA, CSA, ESA, J. Olmsted (STScI)
A distant planet once touted as a potential location to look for alien life is actually most likely to be inhospitable, according to astronomers who have found it probably lacks a solid surface.
In 2015, astronomers discovered a planet 110 light years away called K2-18b, which later analysis estimated to be a super-Earth or mini-Neptune about eight times the mass of our world. Astronomers in 2019…
![Nature Astronomy, doi:10.1038/s41550-022-01634-x Fig. 4 | SCExAO/CHARIS images of AB Aur at different wavelengths and observing modes. Left: polarized intensity wavelength-collapsed image obtained one day later. A pure scattered-light disk feature would have been detected at the position of AB Aur b (green circle). Instead this region shows no concentrated emission, indicating that AB Aur b is not detected. Right: emission at the approximate position of AB Aur b from VAMPIRES H? data using RDI/KLIP for PSF subtraction. From left to right, the intensity scaling is [0, 0.0925] mJy, [0, 0.055] mJy and [?0.007, 0.007] mJy, normalized to the source?s apparent FWHM. The x and y axes are in units of arcseconds east (along the x axis) and north (along the y axis).](https://images.newscientistbeta.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/04/04144318/SEI_97110504.jpg)
