An international team of researchers has used NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope to calculate the amount of heat energy coming from the rocky exoplanet TRAPPIST-1 c. The result suggests that the planet’s atmosphere – if it exists at all – is extremely thin.

A new model of ancient asteroids bombarding the Earth has been applied to understand how oxygen levels in Earth’s atmosphere evolved.

Schaefer is among 18 early-career researchers to receive funding in the inaugural year of Scialog: Signatures of Life in the Universe for her proposal, "Could Nucleic Acid-Based Life Survive on Oxygen-Rich M Dwarf Planets?"

The gases released from meteorite samples heated in a high-temperature furnace can tell scientists about the initial composition of the atmospheres of rocky exoplanets.

New research suggests that hot, rocky planets in other solar systems could form and keep thick atmospheres full of water.

Scientists exploring space are bringing back insights about Earth’s deep past, its complicated relationship with life and our planet’s future.

"This work really highlights the need to consider a planet in a more holistic sense," says Laura Schaefer.

A new study suggests a reason why exoplanets rarely grow larger than Neptune: the planet’s magma oceans begin to eat the sky.

New research using data from NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope has provided a rare glimpse at the surface of a rocky planet outside our solar system. The planet may be similar to Mercury or Earth’s moon, with little to no atmosphere.