When the impossible becomes possible: NASA discovers a planet where it rains sand, not water.

According to a publication in the scientific journal Nature, a group of researchers and astronomers have discovered an unusual phenomenon on a planet located more than 300 light-years from Earth using NASA's James Webb Telescope.

The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) is an international space observatory led by NASA in collaboration with the European Space Agency (ESA) and the Canadian Space Agency (CSA). It is considered the most powerful telescope ever built and is responsible for important discoveries like this one.

As researchers report, within the YSES-1 planetary system, located in the Musca constellation, more than 300 light-years from planet Earth, there are two very young exoplanets, just 16.7 million years old, called YSES-1 b and YSES-1 c.

What's special about these planets, although it's actually just one of them, is that their atmospheres contain clouds composed of silica , the main component of sand, which has revolutionized research into extraterrestrial climates. This discovery represents a new milestone in research into the formation and atmospheric composition of exoplanets and opens up new avenues for astronomical exploration.

These silica particles remain suspended in the atmosphere, similar to the evaporation and condensation of water on Earth. But in this case, the sand undergoes a process called sublimation , by which a substance changes directly from a solid to a gaseous state without passing through a liquid state.

This discovery not only shows that climate conditions can vary dramatically in our solar system, but also provides new insights into the processes that occurred in the early days of the solar system and will improve the climate and chemical models used to interpret exoplanet data.