The Webb telescope detects mysterious water vapor in a nearby star system

This artist’s illustration depicts the rocky exoplanet GJ 486 b, which orbits a red dwarf star located 26 light-years from Earth. Astronomers have detected hints of water vapor in the system, but they can’t be sure if it refers to the planet’s atmosphere or if it is part of the star.

This illustration shows an Earth-sized exoplanet called TOI 700 e, discovered around the young dwarf star M TOI 700, located 100 light-years away. Its other Earth-sized sibling, TOI 700 d, can be seen from a distance.

TOI 700 d is the first potentially habitable Earth-sized planet spotted by NASA’s TESS planet-hunting mission.

Artist’s impression of exoplanet WASP-121b. It belongs to the category of hot Jupiters. Due to its proximity to the central star, the planet’s rotation is gradually restricted in its orbit around it. As a result, one of WASP-121 b’s hemispheres is always facing the star, heating it to temperatures of up to 3,000 degrees Celsius. The night side is always directed towards the cold space, which is why it is 1500 degrees cooler there.

This artist’s impression shows a close-up view of Proxima d, a recently discovered planet orbiting the red dwarf star Proxima Centauri, the nearest star to the Solar System. The planet is believed to be rocky, with a mass a quarter of Earth’s. Also visible in the image are two other planets known to orbit Proxima Centauri: Proxima b, a planet of about the same mass as Earth that orbits the star every 11 days and lies within the habitable zone, and candidate Proxima c, located on a. longer than five years around the star.

The discovery of a second exoplanet hints at the possibility that exomoons are as common as exoplanets.

This artist’s impression shows football-shaped planet WASP-103b (left) orbiting closely around its host star.

This image shows the b Centauri double star system and its giant planet, b Centauri b. The star pair is the bright object on the upper left. The planet appears as a bright dot in the lower right. The other bright spot (upper right) is a star in the background.

This artist’s rendering shows a Jupiter-like planet orbiting a dead white dwarf star 6,500 light-years from Earth. The planet survived the violent stages of stellar evolution that led to the death of the star.

This artist’s illustration shows the night view of the exoplanet WASP-76b, with iron falling from the sky.

Astronomers have identified a new class of habitable planets, which they call Hycean planets. These are hot ocean-covered planets with hydrogen-rich atmospheres.

This artist’s illustration shows L 98-59b, one of the planets in a planetary system 35 light-years from Earth. This planet has half the mass of Venus.

In this artist’s illustration, two gaseous exoplanets can be seen orbiting the bright, sun-like star HD 152843.

An artist’s illustration of TOI-1231 b, a Neptune-like planet about 90 light-years from Earth.

This artist’s conception depicts a violent glow exploding on the star Proxima Centauri as seen from the point of view of a planet orbiting the star named Proxima Centauri b.

Having lost its gaseous envelope, the core of an Earth-sized exoplanet formed a second atmosphere. It’s a toxic mixture of hydrogen, methane, and hydrogen cyanide that’s potentially driven by volcanic activity that occurs beneath its thin crust, which causes its cracked appearance.

This illustration shows the metaphorical measurement of the density of each of the seven planets in the nearby TRAPPIST-1 system. New measurements have revealed the most accurate densities yet for these planets and they are very similar – meaning they also likely have similar compositions.

This artist’s illustration shows the view from the farthest planet in the TOI-178 system.

This artist’s illustration shows TOI-561b, one of the oldest and most mineral-poor planetary systems discovered to date in the Milky Way. Astronomers have found an Earth and two other planets orbiting the star.

This massive and distant exoplanet, called HD106906 b, has an elongated, tilted orbit that makes it take 15,000 Earth years to complete one orbit around its twin stars.

This is an artist’s impression of a sinister, floating planet being discovered in our Milky Way galaxy using a technique called microlensing. Microlensing occurs when an object in space distorts space-time.

This is an artist’s impression of the exoplanet WASP-189 b orbiting its host star. The star appears to glow blue because it is more than 2,000 degrees hotter than our sun. The planet, which is slightly larger than Jupiter, has an inclined orbit around the star’s poles rather than the equator.

For the first time, an exoplanet has been found orbiting a dead star known as a white dwarf. In this artist’s illustration, Jupiter WD 1856 b orbits the white dwarf every day and a half.

This illustration shows a carbon-rich planet with diamond and silica as the two main minerals. Water can turn a carbon-rich planet into one made of diamonds. Inside, the main minerals are diamond and silica (a layer with crystals in the illustration). The core (dark blue) may be made of an alloy of iron and carbon.

This image shows a young, sunlike star orbited by two gas giant exoplanets. It was captured by the SPHERE instrument on the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope. The star can be seen in the upper left corner, and the planets are the two bright spots.

This artist’s impression shows a Neptune-sized planet in the Neptune Desert. It is very rare to find an object of this size and density so close to its star.

This is an artist’s impression of the multi-planetary system of the newly discovered super-Earth orbiting a nearby red dwarf star called Gliese 887.

The newly discovered exoplanet AU Mic b is about the size of Neptune.

This artist’s impression shows a view of the surface of the planet Proxima b orbiting the red dwarf star Proxima Centauri, the nearest star to the Solar System. Proxima b is slightly more massive than Earth.

This is an artist’s illustration of an exoplanet atmosphere with a white dwarf star on the horizon. The light of a white dwarf star passing through the atmosphere of an orbiting exoplanet can reveal whether the planet has biosignatures.

This is an artist’s illustration of the Kepler-88 planetary system, in which a giant exoplanet and two smaller planets orbit the star Kepler-88. The system is more than 1,200 light-years away.