Planets with volcanic activity are considered better candidates for life than worlds without such heated internal goings-on.
Now, graduate students at the University of Washington have found a way to detect volcanic activity in the atmospheres of exoplanets, or those outside our solar system, when they transit, or pass in front of their host stars.
Their findings, published in the June issue of the journal Astrobiology, could aid the process of choosing worlds to study for possible life and even one day help determine not only that a world is habitable, but in fact inhabited.
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