(Photo: Wikimedia Commons/Reeftraveler)
A rare and mysterious phenomenon was observed in a distant world outside our solar system. The "glory" phenomenon was reported to occur in the hellacious conditions of the alien world WASP-76b.
Mysterious Rare Glory on WASP-76b
Astronomers have discovered evidence of a dazzling, multicolored halo of light known as a glory high up in the metal-filled heavens of a world known as WASP-76b. This show has only ever been witnessed on two planets within the Solar System -- Earth and Venus --and never outside of them.
These exquisite color displays of several concentric rings encircling a brilliant center may only occur under certain circumstances. For the light to shine on them, a mist of almost equal-sized spherical droplets is required.
According to astronomer Olivier Demangeon of the Institute of Astrophysics and Space Sciences in Portugal, they can, therefore, learn something about this very strange world's enigmatic atmosphere from its appearance on WASP-76b.
According to the Portuguese astronomer, there's a reason no glory has ever been observed beyond our solar system—it requires extremely unusual circumstances.
To study air particles for an extended period, they must first be nearly perfectly spherical, uniform, and stable. The observer, in this case Cheops, must be perfectly oriented, with the planet's neighboring star shining straight at it.
"This is the first time that such a sharp change has been detected in the brightness of an exoplanet," Olivier added. "This discovery leads us to hypothesize that this unexpected glow could be caused by a strong, localized, and anisotropic (directionally dependent) reflection - the glory effect."
Since the signal is so weak, more research will be required to verify if the object we are seeing on WASP-76b is, in fact, a glory. If it is, that will provide fresh insight into the makeup of the exoplanet's upper atmosphere.
After examining the effect across 23 measurements in three years, it is evident that the spherical aerosol droplets need to be continuously present in the exoplanet clouds or regenerated at a steady pace. Thus, steady long-term temperature conditions in WASP-76b's atmosphere are necessary to support the rare phenomenon.
If the phenomenon proves to be a tremendous marvel, scientists will need to model the Earth's atmosphere to determine what circumstances permit its existence.
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What Is The Glory?
Glory is an optical phenomenon that resembles an iconic saint's halo. It's as mysterious as many deem it to be, but it's actually a physical phenomenon caused by sunlight interacting with water droplets from mists or clouds.
Glory is like a circular rainbow. However, glories are located opposite the sun and form due to backscattering or light hitting tiny water droplets. If the droplets are of the same size, the glory will appear brighter because the size of the glory is inversely proportional to the size of the water droplets.
Visible light, often known as light or white light, is made up of a spectrum of colors, each with a distinct wavelength. A prism divides light into its constituent wavelengths and reassembles it into "normal" light.
This process is known as diffraction in optics, and it can occur with any object that has the required characteristics, even a droplet of water. It is not limited to prisms.
However, light does more than simply get diffracted as it travels through the prism—or, again, any object with the proper parameter—it also bends, a process known as refraction. For example, the red portion of the spectrum bends very little in comparison to the other frequencies, like the violet.
This phenomenon also causes rainbows: light is refracted within water droplets, reflects off the droplet wall, and then refracted once more as it exits the droplet. Similar to the preceding example, the violet bends more, giving us the pattern of seven colors.
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