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Related: About this forumDistant 'waterworld' is confirmed
Source: BBC
21 February 2012 Last updated at 15:44 GMT
Distant 'waterworld' is confirmed
Astronomers have confirmed the existence of a new class of planet: a waterworld with a thick, steamy atmosphere.
The exoplanet GJ 1214b is a so-called "Super Earth" - bigger than our planet, but smaller than gas giants such as Jupiter.
Observations using the Hubble telescope now seem to confirm that a large fraction of its mass is water.
The planet's high temperatures suggest exotic materials might exist there.
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Read more: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-17117030
leftyohiolib
(5,917 posts)Larkspur
(12,804 posts)You know the ones that tried to contact Earth's whales in the Star Trek movie: A Journey Home.
Ian David
(69,059 posts)Ian David
(69,059 posts)Someone on the panel raised the possibility that there might be no clear boundary between ocean and atmosphere.
In other words, as you descend further down through the atmosphere, the water vapor becomes denser and denser, until at some uncertain point it becomes dense enough to be considered liquid.
FogerRox
(13,211 posts)2.7 times Earth diameter, 7 times the weight, looks like a gas giant, not a hydrocarbon gas giant, but an oxygen gas giant. if you will.
FogerRox
(13,211 posts)2.7 times the diameter of Earth and weighs 7 times more.
tridim
(45,358 posts)As in the water is VERY deep?
Or is just a large fraction of the surface covered with water?
Motown_Johnny
(22,308 posts)They can only tell size and mass and they deduce the amount of water based on that.
As far as I know there is no way to know how the water is dispersed.