James Webb Space Telescope Feed Post

Harvard ADS: Characterizing Exoplanetary Atmospheres: New Views on Exoplanet Composition and Chemistry

Paper abstract: I review the major open science questions in exoplanet atmospheres. These are mainly focused in the areas of understanding atmospheric physics, the atmosphere as a window into other realms of planetary physics, and the atmosphere is a window into understanding planet formation. For gas giant planets, high quality spectra have been delivered from JWST and from the ground, enabling the determination of atmospheric abundances. For the very common sub-Neptune planets, we are just beginning to obtain and interpret JWST spectra. For the terrestrial planets, which can be studied only around M stars, the field aims to determine if these planets even have long-lived atmospheres.