Chinese astronomers detect rubidium and samarium in the atmosphere of a distant exoplanet

Using the Echelle SPectrograph for Rocky Exoplanets and Stable Spectroscopic Observations (ESPRESSO), astronomers from the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) have investigated the atmosphere of MASCARA-4b—a distant “ultra-hot Jupiter” exoplanet. The study, published April 11 on the arXiv pre-print server, resulted in the detection of rubidium and samarium in an exoplanet’s atmosphere for the first time.