On Earth, water is so intertwined with life that our search for life on other worlds is essentially a search for water. When scientists find exoplanets around distant stars, a primary consideration is ...

Hycean worlds are also called ocean worlds. They're planets covered in oceans that also have thick hydrogen atmospheres. There are no confirmed hycean worlds but many candidates. Even though they're ...

An exoplanet orbiting a dwarf star 124 light-years from Earth made headlines around the world in April 2025. Researchers at the University of Cambridge reported that planet K2-18b could be a marine ...

New research suggests that many planets previously considered promising for life may, in fact, be far less hospitable. A ...

A team of astronomers using the James Webb Space Telescope have detected biosignatures in the atmosphere of a possible ocean world 124 light-years from the solar system. The scientists behind the ...

"When the Earth's mantle melts, it produces basalts," said Esteban Gazel, professor of engineering. Basalt, a gray-black volcanic rock found throughout the solar system, are key recorders of geologic ...

Hycean worlds, which are a possible kind of exoplanet with deep oceans surrounded by a thick envelope of hydrogen, could provide the best chance for the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) to detect ...