Exoplanet with an atmosphere similar to Earth's detected.

The article from Harvard University represents—right now—the scientific news story of the week, possibly of the month, and even of the year; what the researchers have done is find indications of an atmosphere—though not necessarily one like Earth's—on a rocky planet orbiting within its star's habitable zone.

This world is named LHS 1140 b; it lies 48 light-years away within our own galaxy, the Milky Way. In terms of our cosmic neighborhood, it is right on our street—or, on a galactic scale, on the very same block. The discovery was led by the researchers shown in the photo from Harvard University, and they have stated that this finding—the first of its kind—is expected to drive the search for signs of life.

And indeed, they are right: it is the first of its kind, though not the only one. This discovery also signifies that our technological observational capabilities are improving; every day we have better instruments at our disposal, we are refining our findings, and we have computers and artificial intelligence helping us interpret what we see. Furthermore, several extremely powerful space telescopes are currently in the works.

We have detected atmospheres—this is not the first one, and we have found quite a few, usually around gas giants. Since they are giants, they are easier to detect; keep in mind that we detect what we can see. Therefore, if a planet is large and its star is small, and the planet passes in front of that star, it becomes easier to detect both the planet and its atmosphere. This is because we observe the starlight passing through the planet's atmosphere during that mini-eclipse; the larger the planet, the better, and the closer it is to the star, the better, as the contrast is greater.

We have also detected atmospheres on "super-Earths"—planets similar to Earth but somewhat larger. In fact, the world currently making headlines is also a super-Earth; it is larger than Earth—not vastly so, but larger nonetheless. The atmospheres detected on super-Earths so far have been on very hot ones—worlds like Earth but volcanic, similar to Jupiter's moon Io, or featuring vast oceans of magma (or lava; "magma" is technically more accurate here, as lava refers to material that has erupted from a volcano, whereas magma lies beneath the surface, though at the scale of these oceans, it is essentially magma—as if a solid crust had never formed). The first atmosphere detected on a magma world was found in 2024.

As you can see, these are very recent discoveries; historically speaking, all of this is brand new to science. Take the exoplanet 55 Cancri e, located 41 light-years away: if you’ve seen the *Star Wars* saga and remember the volcanic world of Mustafar with its seas of magma, well, 55 Cancri e is far worse. Its surface is a global ocean, and lava temperatures range from 2,000 to 2,400 degrees Celsius—if the Devil were to visit that world, he would be incinerated. I say this partly in jest, but there is actually a study analyzing the Bible that estimates the temperature of Hell to be 400 degrees, whereas this planet reaches temperatures between 2,000 and 2,400 degrees.

These are incredibly hot and utterly uninhabitable worlds—which is precisely what makes this one so interesting—but we have also detected an atmosphere on a world larger than Earth; it isn't rocky, but rather an ocean world. I am referring to K2-18b. Regarding this ocean world: a molecule was detected there that, here on Earth, is produced by life forms—making it a biomarker, or a sign of potential life. However, a few months after that discovery, a study was published suggesting that the molecule—or rather molecules, since there were two—might actually be the result of chemical reactions between the star's light and the planet's atmosphere.

Then came a response from the discoverers of that biosignature arguing otherwise, on the grounds that chemistry works differently; there is currently an ongoing debate, and everyone is awaiting new data.

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