Exoplanet

In the hunt for extraterrestrial life, most of our attention has been focused on Earth-like worlds. But now, astronomers have defined a new class of exoplanet called “Hycean” worlds that could be a promising place to find signs of life.

Astronomers have captured the first clear images of a colossal moon-forming debris disk orbiting a distant alien planet. According to the authors of the new study, the disk has enough material to create three satellites the size of Earth’s Moon.

Astronomers have counted the number of neutrons inside carbon atoms from 2.8 quadrillion km away. The team managed to measure the ratios of carbon isotopes in the atmosphere of an exoplanet for the first time, which can tell us about how it formed.

Double star systems may be hiding masses of potentially habitable Earth-sized planets in their combined glare. Roughly half of all stars are thought to exist in binary systems, in which two massive stellar bodies orbit around a common centre of mass.

Astronomers have used computer modeling to reveal the chaotic fate of a distant solar system in which the planets orbit in near perfect synchronization, and in the process shed light on how ancient white dwarfs become polluted with debris.

Not all planets orbit stars - some drift freely through the cosmos on their own. These cold, dark worlds don’t make great candidates for hosting life, but a new study suggests that their moons could be more habitable than they might seem.

Scientists may be able to detect the presence of dark matter by searching for anomalous heat signatures from distant alien worlds. Dark matter is an enigmatic, invisible substance that is thought to make up around 80 percent of the universe’s mass.

Computer simulations have revealed that a hostile, tidally locked exoplanet roughly 45 light-years from Earth is capable of hosting tectonic activity — which is one of the key processes that contributes to making a world habitable — on a huge scale.

A new study has found that in about a billion years’ time, Earth will rapidly lose most of its atmospheric oxygen, returning to how it was billions of years ago. This may have important implications in the search for life on other planets.

Astronomers have discovered a nearby system of exoplanets with unusually orderly orbits but disordered densities. Five of the six planets circle the star in a rare rhythmic dance called a resonance chain, while their densities are weirdly shuffled.

WASP-107b was already a very weird exoplanet, with the density of cotton candy. On closer inspection, astronomers have now found that its density is even lower than previously thought, defying our current understanding of how gas giants even form.

Space is an incredibly weird place. From extreme exoplanets to stars with strange fates, clues to an old mystery and the beginnings of a brand new one, here are 10 of the weirdest astronomical discoveries that blew our minds this year.