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research article

High atmospheric metal enrichment for a Saturn-mass planet

Bean, Jacob L. L.
•
Xue, Qiao
•
August, Prune C. C.  
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March 27, 2023
Nature

Atmospheric metal enrichment (that is, elements heavier than helium, also called `metallicity') is a key diagnostic of the formation of giant planets1-3. The giant planets of the Solar System show an inverse relationship between mass and both their bulk metallicities and atmospheric metallicities. Extrasolar giant planets also display an inverse relationship between mass and bulk metallicity(4). However, there is significant scatter in the relationship and it is not known how atmospheric metallicity correlates with either planet mass or bulk metallicity. Here we show that the Saturn-mass exoplanet HD 149026b (refs. 5-9) has an atmospheric metallicity 59-276 times solar (at 1 sigma), which is greater than Saturn's atmospheric metallicity of roughly 7.5 times solar(10) at more than 4 sigma confidence. This result is based on modelling CO2 and H2O absorption features in the thermal emission spectrum of the planet measured by the James Webb Space Telescope. HD 149026b is the most metal-rich giant planet known, with an estimated bulk heavy element abundance of 66 +/- 2% by mass(11,12). We find that the atmospheric metallicities of both HD 149026b and the Solar System giant planets are more correlated with bulk metallicity than planet mass.

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Type
research article
DOI
10.1038/s41586-023-05984-y
Web of Science ID

WOS:000994587100003

Author(s)
Bean, Jacob L. L.
Xue, Qiao
August, Prune C. C.  
Lunine, Jonathan
Zhang, Michael
Thorngren, Daniel
Tsai, Shang-Min
Stassun, Keivan G. G.
Schlawin, Everett
Ahrer, Eva-Maria
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Date Issued

2023-03-27

Publisher

NATURE PORTFOLIO

Published in
Nature
Volume

618

Start page

43

End page

46

Subjects

Multidisciplinary Sciences

•

Science & Technology - Other Topics

Editorial or Peer reviewed

REVIEWED

Written at

EPFL

Available on Infoscience
July 3, 2023
Use this identifier to reference this record
https://infoscience.epfl.ch/handle/20.500.14299/198782
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