Fast litho-panspermia in the habitable zone of the TRAPPIST-1 system

Abstract

With several short-period, Earth-mass planets in the habitable zone, the TRAPPIST-1 system potentially allows litho-panspermia to take place on very short timescales. We investigate the efficiency and speed of inter-planetary material transfer resulting from impacts onto the habitable zone planets. By simulating trajectories of impact ejecta from their moment of ejection until (re-)accretion, we find that transport between the habitable zone planets is fastest for ejection velocities around and just above planetary escape velocity. At these ejection velocities, $\sim 10\%$ of the ejected material reaches another habitable zone planet within $10^2\mathrm{yr}$, indicating litho-panspermia can be 4 to 5 orders of magnitude faster in TRAPPIST-1 than in the Solar System.

Accepted for publication in ApJL

References in corpus (7)

• Seven temperate terrestrial planets around the nearby ultracool dwarf star TRAPPIST-1
• Temperate Earth-sized planets transiting a nearby ultracool dwarf star
• A combined transmission spectrum of the Earth-sized exoplanets TRAPPIST-1 b and c
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• Debris from giant impacts between planetary embryos at large orbital radii
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• Dynamical and biological panspermia constraints within multi-planet exosystems
• Feasibility of Detecting Interstellar Panspermia in Astrophysical Environments
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