sci26004 — Announcement
Rocky Worlds Data Challenge and Workshop
28 May 2026
- By Chris Evans -
The Rocky Worlds Director’s Discretionary Time (DDT) programme, introduced in our newsletter last June, is combining Hubble’s and Webb‘s unique capabilities for exoplanet science to search for evidence of atmospheres on rocky exoplanets in orbit around M-dwarf stars.
The programme is making excellent progress, with all Hubble and Webb data obtained for the first target (GJ 3929 b) and observations scheduled for the next two systems (LHS 1140 b and TOI-771 b). The latest information on the observation scheduling and the analysis and release of the data products is available here.
In addition to the raw data, High Level Science Products (HLSPs) for GJ 3929 b have been provided by the Rocky Worlds Core Implementation Team (see here for further details). These HLSPs are now available in the European Hubble Space Telescope (eHST) and James Webb Space Telescope (eJWST) Science Archives.
To engage the user community in the analysis and interpretation of the MIRI observations from the programme, STScI has launched a Data Challenge that will run until late August 2026. This will feature the completed MIRI observations of GJ 3929 b and simulated observations of LHS 1140 b. Participants are invited to analyse the data and submit their results, with the goal of comparing methods and identifying best practices in the analysis of rocky exoplanet atmospheres. Further information on the Data Challenge is available here.
The Data Challenge will culminate in a workshop at STScI on 16-18 November 2026, as an opportunity for those who participated in the Data Challenge to share experiences and results, as well as discuss the scientific implications of the data. The workshop will include invited and contributed talks, a half-day school for early-career researchers, a mini hackathon to test and compare users’ algorithms and pipelines, and many other opportunities to discuss science related to the Rocky Worlds DDT. Further details are available here.
