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Tech

Astronomers to get glimpse of burning, lava-covered ‘super Earth’

By
Ariel Zilber
Published May 30, 2022, 6:26 p.m. ET

A distant “super-Earth” with a lava-covered surface that is constantly burning is about to be glimpsed by scientists for the first time.

NASA says its James Webb Space Telescope is “just weeks away” from revealing “55 Cancri e,” which it calls a “super-hot super-Earth.”

55 Cancri e — which is about 50 light years from Earth — is fewer than 1.5 million miles from its sun-like star. Compared to our solar system, that’s 1/25th the distance between our sun and Mercury, where the average temperature is fiery 354 degrees Fahrenheit.

It takes 55 Cancri e just 18 hours to revolve around its star, compared to the 365 days it takes Earth to go around our sun.

“With surface temperatures far above the melting point of typical rock-forming minerals, the day side of the planet is thought to be covered in oceans of lava,” NASA said of 55 Cancri e.

“Imagine if Earth were much, much closer to the Sun,” the agency said.

NASA says that its James Webb Space Telescope is "just weeks away" from revealing "55 Cancri e," which it calls the "super-hot super-Earth."
NASA says its James Webb Space Telescope is “just weeks away” from revealing “55 Cancri e,” which it calls a “super-hot super-Earth.” NASA, ESA, CSA, Dani Player (STS

“So close that an entire year lasts only a few hours. So close that gravity has locked one hemisphere in permanent searing daylight and the other in endless darkness,” the agency said.

“So close that the oceans boil away, rocks begin to melt, and the clouds rain lava.”

NASA describes “super-Earths” as “a class of planets unlike any in our solar system.

An illustration compares 55 Cancri e to Earth and Neptune.
An illustration compares 55 Cancri e to Earth and Neptune. NASA, ESA, CSA, Dani Player (STS

“[They] are more massive than Earth yet lighter than ice giants like Neptune and Uranus, and can be made of gas, rock or a combination of both. They are between twice the size of Earth and up to 10 times its mass,” its Web site says.

55 Cancri e was initially viewed through NASA’s less powerful Spitzer Space Telescope, which shows that its hottest spot is not necessary the one facing the star.

NASA scientists have put forward a theory that this is because the planet has “a dynamic atmosphere that moves heat around.”

The planet is so close to its star that a full revolution takes just 18 hours, according to NASA.
The planet is so close to its star that a full revolution takes just 18 hours, according to NASA. NASA

Another theory is that the planet rotates to create day and night, so its “surface would heat up, melt, and even vaporize during the day, forming a very thin atmosphere that Webb could detect,” NASA says.

“In the evening, the vapor would cool and condense to form droplets of lava that would rain back to the surface, turning solid again as night falls.”

The first observation of the planet is expected sometime this summer after the James Webb Space Telescope comes online.

The telescope is also likely to help scientists deepen their understanding of another distant planet — the airless LHS 3844 b.