By 2025, the number of exoplanets tracked by NASA has officially exceeded 6,000 – with several thousand more awaiting confirmation. Space portal.com speak about the most important discoveries from the world of distant (and potentially habitable) planets.
Planet “Tatooine”
The catalog of exoplanets has been expanded with new worlds reminiscent of Tatooine in the Star Wars series – they orbit two stars, sometimes in configurations that defy the basic rules of planet formation.
The strangest of these worlds was discovered in April. 2M1510(AB)b orbits two brown dwarfs, sometimes called “failed stars” because they are not massive enough to cause a nuclear reaction. The planet lies about 120 light-years from Earth, orbiting above and below the poles of the two stars.
And then, astronomers found three Earth-sized planets orbiting the compact binary system TOI-2267 just 73 light-years from Earth. Furthermore, all three orbit both stars, although such closely related star pairs are considered gravitationally unstable environments for the formation of planets.
TRAPPIST-1E is incompatible with life
New analyzes of TRAPPIST-1E, one of seven Earth-sized planets in the system about 40 light-years from Earth, suggest the exoplanet may not have a thick enough atmosphere. This, in turn, reduces the chances of finding the liquid water necessary for life.
Previous observations through the James Webb Space Telescope have found traces of methane in the atmosphere, raising the possibility of complex chemistry or even biological activity. But unfortunately, subsequent studies concluded that these signals may have been contaminated by the star itself. And computer simulations show that any methane on TRAPPIST-1E would be quickly destroyed by strong ultraviolet radiation. This supply will only last for 200,000 years, not long enough for geological processes to compensate for the losses.
New look of Proxima Centauri
In 2025, astronomers also took a closer look at the planetary system around Proxima Centauri, the closest star to the Sun, just 4.2 light-years from Earth. They were helped in this by a new instrument – NIRPS, a high-resolution spectrometer located in Chile.
Observations confirmed the presence of Proxima b, an Earth-sized planet that orbits within the star's habitable zone. NIRPS also confirmed the existence of a smaller planet, Proxima d, and helped eliminate a third world from the theoretical list.
The tail of the world is about to die
Some exoplanets pass so close to their stars that they leave behind long tails of material.
One such world, BD+05 4868 Ab, is located just 140 light-years from Earth, in the constellation Pegasus. The planet orbits the star every 30.5 hours, with an orbit about 20 times closer to the star than Mercury's orbit with our Sun. At such a close distance, the powerful heat of the star evaporates material from the planet's surface, thereby forming a long tail (up to 9 million km).
Extremely hot Jupiter WASP-121b also has a tail but of a completely different nature. It is 858 light-years from Earth and has lost not its rocks but its own atmosphere: two giant helium tails spanning nearly 60% of the planet's orbit. One is in the back, where it is pushed forward by the star's radiation and winds, and the other is in the front, pulled by the star's gravity.
The lava world has no air
Using the James Webb Space Telescope, astronomers have found an atmosphere on a planet that, according to all accepted rules, should not have an atmosphere in principle.
TOI-561b is a small, hot lava planet orbiting one of the oldest stars in the Milky Way. Moreover, it is so close to this star that a year in this world lasts less than a day on earth. One side of TOI-561b is permanently facing the star, causing it to heat up to temperatures exceeding 1,726 degrees Celsius. It is also old enough that its primordial atmosphere has long since evaporated.
But she did not evaporate. Observations have shown that the planet's illuminated side is cooler than predicted from bare, airless rock. Thus, TOI-561b in the distant past had a fairly solid atmosphere, which could exist for billions of years and redistribute heat throughout the planet.
The birth and death of an alien planet
Finally, in 2025, astronomers were able to witness two cosmic moments that determined the life of the planet.
Therefore, in a study, scientists recorded the unprecedented moment of the formation of a planet 437 light years from Earth. In a telescope it appears only as a pale purple dot. The newborn planet, WISPIT 2b, is only 5 million years old but is already about five times larger than Jupiter.
And getting closer to Earth, they noticed the remains of a dead star. Observations of the white dwarf LSPM J0207+3331, the dense remnant of a long-dead giant star 145 light-years from Earth, have revealed the process of planetary remnant destruction.
