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Astronomers Detect a Possible Signature of Life on a Distant Planet

(www.nytimes.com)
168 points julienchastang | 2 comments | 16 Apr 25 23:20 UTC | HN request time: 1.051s | source
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smitty1e ◴[16 Apr 25 23:41 UTC] No.43711517[source]▶
> While inspecting K2-18b, Dr. Madhusudhan and his colleagues discovered it had many of the molecules they had predicted a Hycean planet would possess. In 2023, they reported they had also detected faint hints of another molecule, and one of huge potential importance: dimethyl sulfide, which is made of sulfur, carbon, and hydrogen. On Earth, the only known source of dimethyl sulfide is life.

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Intriguing.

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Loughla ◴[16 Apr 25 23:53 UTC] No.43711610[source]▶
It's absolutely amazing that we can even figure out molecules at that distance. I'm sure it's accurate but it's so sciency to me that it might as well be made up entirely. I can't begin to fathom that process.
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1. jcranmer ◴[17 Apr 25 00:56 UTC] No.43711962[source]▶
> I can't begin to fathom that process.

It's basically "look at far away object with a fancy pair of sunglasses."

Because of quantum mechanical reasons, molecules can only absorb and emit light with very particular energy levels (which correspond to frequency/wavelength). So point your camera at an exoplanet and carefully record the amount of the light you see at different wavelengths. My guess is that it's based on IR spectroscopy, since there's a nice region of that spectra where you can "fingerprint" a molecule based on the peaks in absorption in that region (it's literally called the "fingerprint region").

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2. UltraSane ◴[17 Apr 25 03:21 UTC] No.43712786[source]▶
It isn't that simple. It took a lot of careful calibration to be able to determine the amount of ratio of materials from spectroscopy. This is what led to determining the Sun is mostly hydrogen.