What can lava planets, rocky exoplanets that are tidally locked and orbit so close to their stars that the intense heat melts the surface, teach astronomers about planetary formation and evolution?

A new paper led by a York University professor and published today in Nature Astronomy introduces a simple theoretical framework to describe the evolution of the coupled interior–atmosphere system of ...

A rocky planet nearly 50 light-years away appears to be airless, dark, and covered in volcanic or weathered rock, according ...

Lava planets don’t play by the rules of our solar system. These scorching-hot worlds, some no bigger than Earth, orbit so close to their stars that a full year lasts less than a day. With their ...

TORONTO, July 29, 2025 – A new paper led by a York University professor and published today in Nature Astronomy introduces a simple theoretical framework to describe the evolution of the coupled ...

Talk about a hot mess. Scientists have uncovered a hellish “lava world” where temperatures soar to a blistering 2,700 degrees Fahrenheit — hot enough to melt rock into a churning ocean of magma and ...

Scientists have discovered the strongest evidence yet of a rocky planet with an atmosphere outside the solar system, challenging previous notions that small planets that orbit closely to their stars ...

Astronomers have uncovered a distant planetary system that flips a long-standing rule of planet formation on its head. Around the small red dwarf star LHS 1903, scientists expected to find rocky ...

Artistic illustration of the internal structure of a lava planet in a cold state, showing a day‑side magma ocean overlain by a mineral atmosphere. The arrows indicate the direction of heat transport ...

In Star Wars, Anakin Skywalker burned alive on the shores of a roiling lava planet called Mustafar, fueling his tumultuous transition into Darth Vader. Now, astronomers have found an atmosphere on a ...