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New Exoplanet Research: Magnetic Fields Significantly Affect Hot Jupiter Atmospheres
Click on the above image to see a video of Jupiter’s atmosphere. While Jupiter is drastically different from hot Jupiters, it’s atmospheric circulation is proving to be similar. Image Credit: NASA.
Determining weather patterns in exoplanet atmospheres – hundreds to thousands of light years away – is extremely difficult. However, given that it may be one of our best ways to truly characterize these alien words, it’s a challenge astronomers have accepted willingly.
Most models have a very simple foundation, necessarily eliminating the complex physics that is difficult to incorporate and analyze. Recently, a team led by Dr. Konstantin Batygin of Harvard University, added one more parameter to their models, drastically changing their results.
The punch line is this: the inclusion of magnetic fields significantly changes, and actually simplifies, the atmospheric circulation of hot Jupiters.
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Read the rest of New Exoplanet Research: Magnetic Fields Significantly Affect Hot Jupiter Atmospheres (405 words)
© Shannon Hall for Universe Today, 2013. |
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Post tags: Exoplanet atmospheres, Extrasolar Planets, hot Jupiters
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Source: http://www.universetoday.com/104385/new-exoplanet-research-magnetic-fields-significantly-affect-hot-jupiter-atmospheres/
