JWST transmission spectra of WASP-121b Virtual Observatory Resource

Authors
  1. Gapp C.
  2. Evans-Soma T.M.
  3. Barstow J.K.
  4. Lothringer J.D.
  5. Sing D.K.,Ruseva D.
  6. Ahrer E.-M.
  7. Goyal J.M.
  8. Christie D.
  9. Kreidberg L.
  10. Mayne N.J.
  11. Published by
    CDS
Abstract

WASP-121 b has been established as a benchmark ultrahot Jupiter, serving as a laboratory for the atmospheric chemistry and dynamics of strongly irradiated extrasolar gas giants. Here, we present and analyze WASP-121 b's transmission spectrum observed with NIRSpec G395H on board the James Webb Space Telescope and find evidence for the thermal dissociation of H2O and H2 on the planet's permanent dayside. Additionally, we detect SiO at a statistical significance of 5.2{sigma}, which is compatible with chemical equilibrium in the atmosphere. Constraining the abundance of SiO and abundance ratios between silicon and volatile atoms in WASP-121 b's atmosphere could help discriminate between possible migration histories of the planet. The three-dimensional nature of thermal dissociation on WASP-121 b's dayside and of recombination on its nightside, however, poses a challenge to constraining molecular abundances and elemental abundance ratios from the transmission spectrum. To account for this, we implemented an atmospheric model in the NEMESIS framework that splits the planet's atmosphere into dayside and nightside. A retrieval applying our atmospheric model to WASP-121 b's transmission spectrum favors a higher H2O abundance on the nightside than on the dayside, demonstrating the impact of hemispheric heterogeneity when attempting to constrain WASP-121 b's bulk H2O inventory.

Keywords
  1. exoplanets
  2. infrared-astronomy
  3. spectroscopy
Bibliographic source Bibcode
2025AJ....169..341G
See also HTML
https://cdsarc.cds.unistra.fr/viz-bin/cat/J/AJ/169/341
IVOA Identifier IVOID
ivo://CDS.VizieR/J/AJ/169/341

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History

2026-03-20T15:52:26Z
Resource record created
2026-03-20T15:09:33Z
Updated
2026-03-20T15:52:26Z
Created

Contact

Name
CDS support team
Postal Address
CDS, Observatoire de Strasbourg, 11 rue de l'Universite, F-67000 Strasbourg, France
E-Mail
cds-question@unistra.fr