Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

EXOPLANETS

Oxygen as atmospheric thermometer

Nature Astronomy volume 6, pages 182–183 (2022)Cite this article

Subjects

Oxygen is the building block of key species in planetary atmospheres and a potential life indicator. Ground-based spectroscopy is now used to detect oxygen on an ultra-hot Jupiter and to prove departure from thermochemical equilibrium.

Studying the properties of exoplanetary atmospheres, initially the exclusive dominion of the Hubble and Spitzer space telescopes4,5, has become possible with ground-based telescopes too, by taking spectra at very high resolution. This technique allows robust identification of species, with an inventory of detected atoms or molecules that grows by the day6. High-resolution spectroscopy exploits the changing Doppler shift of short-period exoplanets, which reflects the fast change in orbital radial velocity (KELT-9b orbits its parent star in only 1.5 days). This fast, periodic wobble of spectral lines sets the exoplanet apart from any contaminating source and allows astronomers to confidently identify its signature against that of its parent star and of the Earth’s atmosphere7.

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution

Access options

Rent or buy this article

Get just this article for as long as you need it

$39.95

Learn more

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

Fig. 1: Artist’s impression of KELT-9b (bottom) orbiting around its A-type star (top).

References

  1. Madhusudhan, N. Astrophys. J. 758, 36–57 (2012).

    Article  ADS  Google Scholar 

  2. Borsa, F. et al. Nat. Astron. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41550-021-01544-4 (2022).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  3. Gaudi, B. S. et al. Nature 546, 514–518 (2017).

    Article  ADS  Google Scholar 

  4. Charbonneau, D. et al. Astrophys. J. 568, 377–384 (2002).

    Article  ADS  Google Scholar 

  5. Deming, D. et al. Nature 434, 740–743 (2005).

    Article  ADS  Google Scholar 

  6. Giacobbe, P. et al. Nature 592, 205–208 (2021).

    Article  ADS  Google Scholar 

  7. Snellen, I. A. G. et al. Nature 465, 1049–1051 (2010).

    Article  ADS  Google Scholar 

  8. Barman, T. S. et al. Astrophys. J. Lett. 569, L51–L54 (2002).

    Article  ADS  Google Scholar 

  9. Fortney, J. J. et al. Astrophys. J. 589, 615–622 (2003).

    Article  ADS  Google Scholar 

  10. Fisher, C. & Heng, K. Astrophys. J. 881, 25–43 (2019).

    Article  ADS  Google Scholar 

  11. Mordasini, C. et al. Astrophys. J. 832, 41–73 (2016).

    Article  ADS  Google Scholar 

  12. Arcangeli, J. et al. Astrophys. J. Lett. 855, L30 (2018).

    Article  ADS  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Physics, University of Warwick, Coventry, UK

    Matteo Brogi

Authors
  1. Matteo Brogi
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Matteo Brogi.

Ethics declarations

Competing interests

The author declares no competing interests.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and Permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Brogi, M. Oxygen as atmospheric thermometer. Nat Astron 6, 182–183 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41550-021-01587-7

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41550-021-01587-7

Search

Advanced search

Quick links

Nature Briefing

Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing