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Hot Jupiters are Too Hot for Water to Handle

New hot take explains why the exoplanets never have signs of water vapor.

By Bill Andrews
Jan 1, 2019 6:00 PMJan 3, 2020 11:57 PM
Hot Jupiter - NASA
(Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/AIX-Marseille University)

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Exoplanets known as ultra-hot Jupiters (because of their extreme temperature and size) seem to lack water vapor. Astronomers didn’t know why until an August paper in Astronomy & Astrophysics showed that the worlds’ atmospheres are just too darn hot, tearing apart any water molecules shortly after they form. The finding further blurs the line between exoplanets and stars.

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