WASP-127b: Extreme winds race around exoplanets at 33,000 km/h

An international research team has measured winds raging around the equator at speeds of up to 33,000 kilometers per hour on an exoplanet 500 light years away from us. This was made public by the University of Göttingen, where astronomer Lisa Nortmann led the analysis. The surprising values were determined using a high-resolution infrared spectrograph at the Very Large Telescope of the European Southern Observatory, ESO in Chile. The team has thus first confirmed that water vapor and carbon monoxide are present in the atmosphere of the giant gas planet called WASP-127b. However, the measured values for the speed of the matter were then completely unexpected.

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As the research team explains, the measurement was made by analyzing the light that traveled from the parent star through the gas giant’s upper atmospheric layer on its way to us. Even if the different regions of the exoplanet cannot be resolved visually, it is possible to determine the speeds at which the matter is moving there. In the case of WASP-127b, two neighboring extreme values were determined, which opposed each other. It was then determined that the atmosphere was moving towards us at high speed on one side and away from us at high speed on the other. The extreme jet stream winds are supposed to explain this.

Overall, it has been determined that complex weather patterns exist on the exoplanet that are similar to those on Earth and other planets in the solar system, the team writes. The work also shows once again the speed at which the exploration of exoplanets is currently progressing thanks to ever-improving technology. The ESO also points out that this measurement of wind speeds on exoplanets is currently only possible with instruments on the ground. Space telescopes therefore do not have the necessary speed precision. The research work on the wind on WASP-127b was published in Astronomy & Astrophysics.

(my)