TRAPPIST-1 is an ultra-cool red dwarf star that is slightly larger, but much more massive, than the planet Jupiter, located about 40 light-years from the sun in the constellation Aquarius.

Among planetary systems, TRAPPIST-1 is of particular interest because seven planets have been detected orbiting this star, a larger number of planets than have been than detected in any other exoplanetary system. In addition, all of the TRAPPIST-1 planets are Earth-sized and terrestrial, making them an ideal focus of study for planet formation and potential habitability. Artist's concept shows what the TRAPPIST-1 planetary system may look like, based on available data about the planets' diameters, masses and distances from the host star, as of February 2018. Credit: NASA/JPL- Caltech Download Full Image

ASU scientists Cayman Unterborn, Steven Desch and Alejandro Lorenzo of the School of Earth and Space Exploration, with Natalie Hinkel of Vanderbilt University, have been studying these planets for habitability, specifically related to water composition. Their findings have been recently published in Nature Astronomy.

The calculations equal water

The TRAPPIST-1 planets are curiously light. From their measured mass and volume, all of this system’s planets are less dense than rock. On many other, similarly low-density worlds, it is thought that this less-dense component consists of atmospheric gasses.

“But the TRAPPIST-1 planets are too small in mass to hold onto enough gas to make up the density deficit,” geoscientist Unterborn explained. “Even if they were able to hold onto the gas, the amount needed to make up the density deficit would make the planet much puffier than we see.”

So scientists studying this planetary system have determined that the low-density component must be something else that is abundant: water. This has been predicted before, and possibly even seen on larger planets like GJ1214b, so the interdisciplinary ASU-Vanderbilt team, comprised of geoscientists and astrophysicists, set out to determine just how much water could be present on these Earth-sized planets and how and where the planets may have formed.

But how much is there?

To determine the composition of the TRAPPIST-1 planets, the team used a unique software package, developed by Unterborn and Lorenzo, that uses state-of-the-art mineral physics calculators. The software, called ExoPlex, allowed the team to combine all of the available information about the TRAPPIST-1 system, including the chemical makeup of the star, rather than being limited to just the mass and radius of individual planets.

Much of the data used by the team to determine composition was collected from a dataset called the Hypatia Catalog, developed by contributing author Hinkel. This catalog merges data on the stellar abundances of stars near to our sun, from over 150 literature sources, into a massive repository.