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The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) has been peering into the world of an extremely young gas planet several light years from Earth. However, scientists don't have much time to learn about it as planet AF Lep b will soon vanish for the next 10 years. 

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The newly discovered exoplanet is only 23 million years old and is special because not a lot of young planets are commonly found. In comparison, our Earth is around 4.5 billion years old. Till now, over 5,700 exoplanets have been confirmed to exist in the universe.

The exoplanet is orbiting its star and will soon move extremely near to it, making it impossible to view AF Lep b for over a decade because of the brightness.

"AF Lep b is right at the inner edge of being detectable," said Kyle Franson, an astronomer and graduate student at The University of Texas at Austin.

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The research team quickly applied for "Director’s Discretionary Time" from the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore, to get time with the Webb telescope and know more about the planet. 

They zoomed into AF Lep b and published their findings in the peer-reviewed science publication The Astrophysical Journal Letters.

Planet AF Lep b has a 'very active atmosphere'

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Webb's coronagraph is a useful tool that helps block the brightness of a nearby star to help observe a much fainter target. In the case of AF Lep b, the coronagraph blocked 90 per cent of the star's light. 

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Scientists noted that it is located 88 light-years away. 

The astronomers also found that AF Lep b is about three times the mass of Jupiter. It also has a "very active atmosphere", as hints of carbon monoxide have been detected. "The only way to get gas of that type into the planet’s upper atmosphere is with strong updrafts," William Balmer, a coauthor of the research at Johns Hopkins University, added.

The Webb telescope is a joint effort by NASA, ESA, and the Canadian Space Agency and aims to look into the initial years of the cosmos. It also studies planets and other bodies in our solar system.