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Webb Detects Tiny Quartz Crystals in the Clouds of a Hot Gas Giant


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Webb Detects Tiny Quartz Crystals in the Clouds of a Hot Gas Giant

Researchers using NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope have detected evidence for quartz nanocrystals in the high-altitude clouds of WASP-17 b, a hot Jupiter exoplanet 1,300 light-years from Earth. The detection, which was uniquely possible with MIRI (Webb’s Mid-Infrared Instrument), marks the first time that silica (SiO2) particles have been spotted in an exoplanet atmosphere.

Illustration showing a portion of the disk of a cloudy planet set against the black background of space. About one-eighth of the planet is visible. It fills the lower right half of the frame, with the limb (the edge, or horizon) curving from the bottom left corner to the upper right corner. The planet is partially lit by a star that is off to the upper left, out of view. The planet is brightest along the limb (on the dayside), and grows dimmer toward the lower right corner (the nightside), becoming almost completely dark about halfway in. Wispy, light-tan-colored clouds are visible in the lit portion and there is a hazy blueish glow along the horizon. Several stars are scattered in the background.
This artist concept shows what the exoplanet WASP-17 b could look like.
Graphics: NASA, ESA, CSA, and R. Crawfor, d (STScI)Science: Nikole Lewis (Cornell University), David Grant (University of Bristol), Hannah Wakeford (University of Bristol) Crawford (STScI)

“We were thrilled!” said David Grant, a researcher at the University of Bristol in the UK and first author on a paper being published today in the Astrophysical Journal Letters. “We knew from Hubble observations that there must be aerosols—tiny particles making up clouds or haze—in WASP-17 b’s atmosphere, but we didn’t expect them to be made of quartz.”

Silicates (minerals rich in silicon and oxygen) make up the bulk of Earth and the Moon as well as other rocky objects in our solar system, and are extremely common across the galaxy. But the silicate grains previously detected in the atmospheres of exoplanets and brown dwarfs appear to be made of magnesium-rich silicates like olivine and pyroxene, not quartz alone – which is pure SiO2.


The result from this team, which also includes researchers from NASA’s Ames Research Center and NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, puts a new spin on our understanding of how exoplanet clouds form and evolve. “We fully expected to see magnesium silicates,” said co-author Hannah Wakeford, also from the University of Bristol. “But what we’re seeing instead are likely the building blocks of those, the tiny ‘seed’ particles needed to form the larger silicate grains we detect in cooler exoplanets and brown dwarfs.”

Detecting Subtle Variations


With a volume more than seven times that of Jupiter and a mass less than one-half Jupiter, WASP-17 b is one of the largest and puffiest known exoplanets. This, along with its short orbital period of just 3.7 Earth-days, makes the planet ideal for transmission spectroscopy : a technique that involves measuring the filtering and scattering effects of a planet’s atmosphere on starlight.


Webb observed the WASP-17 system for nearly 10 hours, collecting more than 1,275 brightness measurements of 5- to 12-micron mid-infrared light as the planet crossed its star. By subtracting the brightness of individual wavelengths of light that reached the telescope when the planet was in front of the star from those of the star on its own, the team was able to calculate the amount of each wavelength blocked by the planet’s atmosphere.


What emerged was an unexpected “bump” at 8.6 microns, a feature that would not be expected if the clouds were made of magnesium silicates or other possible high temperature aerosols like aluminum oxide, but which makes perfect sense if they are made of quartz.

alt="Graphic titled “Hot Gas Giant Exoplanet WASP-17 b Composition of Cloud Particles, MIRI Low-Resolution Time-Series Spectroscopy” showing 28 data points plotted as white circles with vertical error bars on a graph of amount of light blocked in percent on the y-axis versus wavelength of light in microns on the x-axis. The y-axis ranges from 1.45 to 1.65 percent. The x-axis ranges from 5 to 12 microns. A jagged purple line is labeled “Model spectrum based on Webb, Hubble, and Spitzer data.” One broad, prominent peak visible in the data and model is highlighted with a vertical green band labeled “Light blocked by quartz (S I O 2) crystals.” The peak is centered at about 8.6 microns and 1.59 percent. Running across the green band below the purple peak, is a jagged dashed yellow line labeled “What the spectrum would look like with no quartz clouds.” This line slopes down to the right. In the background is an illustration of a planet with wispy clouds and a hazy blueish glow along the horizon."
A transmission spectrum of the hot gas giant exoplanet WASP-17 b captured by Webb’s Mid-Infrared Instrument (MIRI) on March 12-13, 2023, reveals the first evidence for quartz (crystalline silica, SiO2) in the clouds of an exoplanet. The spectrum was made by measuring the change in brightness of 28 wavelength-bands of mid-infrared light as the planet transited the star. Webb observed the WASP-17 system using MIRI’s low-resolution spectrograph for nearly 10 hours, collecting more than 1,275 measurements before, during, and after the transit. For each wavelength, the amount of light blocked by the planet’s atmosphere (white circles) was calculated by subtracting the amount that made it through the atmosphere from the amount originally emitted by the star. The solid purple line is a best-fit model to the Webb (MIRI), Hubble, and Spitzer data. (The Hubble and Spitzer data cover wavelengths from 0.34 to 4.5 microns and are not shown on the graph.) The spectrum shows a clear feature around 8.6 microns, which astronomers think is caused by silica particles absorbing some of the starlight passing through the atmosphere. The dashed yellow line shows what that part of the transmission spectrum would look like if the clouds in WASP-17 b’s atmosphere did not contain SiO2. This marks the first time that SiO2 has been identified in an exoplanet, and the first time any specific cloud species has been identified in a transiting exoplanet.
Graphics: NASA, ESA, CSA, and R. Crawfor, d (STScI)Science: Nikole Lewis (Cornell University), David Grant (University of Bristol), Hannah Wakeford (University of Bristol) Crawford (STScI)

Download full resolution images for this article from the Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI)

Crystals, Clouds, and Winds


While these crystals are probably similar in shape to the pointy hexagonal prisms found in geodes and gem shops on Earth, each one is only about 10 nanometers across—one-millionth of one centimeter.


“Hubble data actually played a key role in constraining the size of these particles,” explained co-author Nikole Lewis of Cornell University, who leads the Webb Guaranteed Time Observation (GTO) program designed to help build a three-dimensional view of a hot Jupiter atmosphere. “We know there is silica from Webb’s MIRI data alone, but we needed the visible and near-infrared observations from Hubble for context, to figure out how large the crystals are.”


Unlike mineral particles found in clouds on Earth, the quartz crystals detected in the clouds of WASP-17 b are not swept up from a rocky surface. Instead, they originate in the atmosphere itself. “WASP-17 b is extremely hot—around 1,500 degrees Celsius (2,700°F)—and the pressure where they form high in the atmosphere is only about one-thousandth of what we experience on Earth’s surface,” explained Grant. “In these conditions, solid crystals can form directly from gas, without going through a liquid phase first.”


Understanding what the clouds are made of is crucial for understanding the planet as a whole. Hot Jupiters like WASP-17 b are made primarily of hydrogen and helium, with small amounts of other gases like water vapor (H2O) and carbon dioxide (CO2). “If we only consider the oxygen that is in these gases, and neglect to include all of the oxygen locked up in minerals like quartz (SiO2), we will significantly underestimate the total abundance,” explained Wakeford. “These beautiful silica crystals tell us about the inventory of different materials and how they all come together to shape the environment of this planet.”


Exactly how much quartz there is, and how pervasive the clouds are, is hard to determine. “The clouds are likely present along the day/night transition (the terminator), which is the region that our observations probe,” said Grant. Given that the planet is tidally locked with a very hot day side and cooler night side, it is likely that the clouds circulate around the planet, but vaporize when they reach the hotter day side. “The winds could be moving these tiny glassy particles around at thousands of miles per hour.”


WASP-17 b is one of three planets targeted by the JWST-Telescope Scientist Team’s Deep Reconnaissance of Exoplanet Atmospheres using Multi-instrument Spectroscopy (DREAMS) investigations, which are designed to gather a comprehensive set of observations of one representative from each key class of exoplanets: a hot Jupiter, a warm Neptune, and a temperate rocky planet. The MIRI observations of hot Jupiter WASP-17 b were made as part of GTO program 1353.


The James Webb Space Telescope is the world’s premier space science observatory. Webb is solving mysteries in our solar system, looking beyond to distant worlds around other stars, and probing the mysterious structures and origins of our universe and our place in it. Webb is an international program led by NASA with its partners, ESA (European Space Agency) and the Canadian Space Agency.

Media Contacts:

Laura Betz
NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md.
laura.e.betz@nasa.gov

Christine Pulliam
Space Telescope Science Institute, Baltimore, Md.
cpulliam@stsci.edu

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      Credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, G. Villanueva (NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center), A. Pagan (STScI), L. Hustak (STScI) 10. Webb can size up asteroids that may be headed for Earth.
      In 2024 astronomers discovered an asteroid that, based on preliminary calculations, had a chance of hitting Earth. Such potentially hazardous asteroids become an immediate focus of attention, and Webb was uniquely able to measure the object, which turned out to be the size of a 15-story building. While this particular asteroid is no longer considered a threat to Earth, the study demonstrated Webb’s ability to assess the hazard.
      Webb also provided support for NASA’s Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) mission, which deliberately smashed into the Didymos binary asteroid system, showing that a planned impact could deflect an asteroid on a collision course with Earth. Both Webb and Hubble observed the impact, serving witness to the resulting spray of material that was ejected. Webb’s spectroscopic observations of the system confirmed that the composition of the asteroids is probably typical of those that could threaten Earth.
      —-
      In just three years of operations, Webb has brought the distant universe into focus, revealing unexpectedly bright and numerous galaxies. It has unveiled new stars in their dusty cocoons, remains of exploded stars, and skeletons of entire galaxies. It has studied weather on gas giants, and hunted for atmospheres on rocky planets. And it has provided new insights into the residents of our own solar system.
      But this is only the beginning. Engineers estimate that Webb has enough fuel to continue observing for at least 20 more years, giving us the opportunity to answer additional questions, pursue new mysteries, and put together more pieces of the cosmic puzzle.
      For example: What were the very first stars like? Did stars form differently in the early universe? Do we even know how galaxies form? How do stars, dust, and supermassive black holes affect each other? What can merging galaxy clusters tell us about the nature of dark matter? How do collisions, bursts of stellar radiation, and migration of icy pebbles affect planet-forming disks? Can atmospheres survive on rocky worlds orbiting active red dwarf stars? Is Uranus’s moon Ariel an ocean world?
      As with any scientific endeavor, every answer raises more questions, and Webb has shown that its investigative power is unmatched. Demand for observing time on Webb is at an all-time high, greater than any other telescope in history, on the ground or in space. What new findings await?
      By Dr. Macarena Garcia Marin and Margaret W. Carruthers, Space Telescope Science Institute, Baltimore, Maryland
      Media Contacts
      Laura Betz – laura.e.betz@nasa.gov
      NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md.
      Christine Pulliam – cpulliam@stsci.edu
      Space Telescope Science Institute, Baltimore, Md.
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      Last Updated Jul 02, 2025 Editor Marty McCoy Contact Laura Betz laura.e.betz@nasa.gov Related Terms
      James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) Astrophysics Black Holes Brown Dwarfs Exoplanet Science Exoplanets Galaxies Galaxies, Stars, & Black Holes Goddard Space Flight Center Nebulae Science & Research Star-forming Nebulae Stars Studying Exoplanets The Universe View the full article
    • By European Space Agency
      Image: A starburst shines in infrared (MIRI) View the full article
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