Supersonic winds discovered on distant exoplanet, researchers say
Astronomers have measured the fastest jetstream ever recorded on a planet, with winds reaching speeds of up to 33,000 km/h on the giant exoplanet WASP-127b. This discovery, made using the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope (ESO’s VLT) in Chile, sheds light on extreme weather patterns far beyond the Solar System, Kazinform News Agency reports.
“Part of the atmosphere of this planet is moving towards us at a high velocity while another part is moving away from us at the same speed. This signal shows us that there is a very fast, supersonic, jet wind around the planet’s equator.” says Lisa Nortmann, a scientist at the University of Göttingen, Germany, and lead author of the study.
The WASP-127b planet located over 500 light-years from Earth is described to be “slightly larger than Jupiter, but has only a fraction of its mass”. The winds at the speed of 9 km per second are nearly six times faster than the planet's rotation speed, far surpassing the fastest wind measured in the Solar System, recorded on Neptune at 1,800 km/h. This is something we haven’t seen before,” says Nortmann.
The team mapped out the weather and atmosphere of WASP-127b and also confirmed the presence of water vapor and carbon monoxide in the planet’s atmosphere. Tracking the speed of these materials, the team observed a surprising double peak, indicating that one side of the atmosphere is moving towards us and the other away at high speed, which they concluded was caused by powerful jetstream winds around the equator.
“This shows that the planet has complex weather patterns just like Earth and other planets of our own System,” said Fei Yan, a professor at the University of Science and Technology of China and co-author of the study.
Scientists believe that the findings pave the way for further research with upcoming observatories like ESO’s Extremely Large Telescope, which is expected to expand studies to smaller, rocky planets and resolve even finer details of wind patterns.
Earlier, a Kazinform correspondent reported on a six-planet parade, featuring Mars, Jupiter, Uranus, Venus, Neptune, and Saturn, visible during prime viewing times around January 21 and 25.
