Strange New Worlds

Is there a universal divide between planets with and without atmospheres? Is it based on their incident fluxes and escape velocities? By studying exoplanets that span the cosmic shoreline, we have begun to place constraints on the prevalence of atmospheres around rocky worlds and the mechanisms that drive their escape. JWST has already produced a bevy of announcements, starting with its first confirmed rocky exoplanet and culminating in some intriguing results that favor secondary atmospheres. Using the lessons learned from the first two years of science operations, new JWST programs are pushing the limits of atmospheric detection toward Earth-size, habitable-zone planets. I will present the current status of the field, provide commentary on the preliminary detections, and discuss several paths forward. While we have only just begun to scratch the surface of rocky exoplanets, in the years to come we can look forward to new breakthroughs as we undertake more precise studies.

Speaker: Kevin Stevenson (Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory)

Talks are held in the STScI John N. Bahcall Auditorium. Light lunch (provided) starts at 12pm; talk starts at 12:30pm.

Planets, Life, and the Universe Lecture Series presentations are also webcast live. Webcasts can be viewed at the STScI webcast site during the scheduled presentation, and can be found afterward in the STScI webcast archive.

STScI is located in the Muller Building on the Johns Hopkins University Homewood campus. View a JHU map and directions