JWST Found Hints of Biological Activity at K2-18b with Dr. Nikku Madhusudhan

Dr. Nikku Madhusudhan of the University of Cambridge discusses a major breakthrough in the search for life beyond Earth. Using the James Webb Space Telescope, his team has detected the chemical fingerprints of dimethyl sulfide (DMS) and dimethyl disulfide (DMDS) in the atmosphere of K2-18 b. These compounds, which on Earth are associated mostly with biological activity, suggest that this distant potential Hycean world may be one of the most promising candidates for alien life outside our solar system. The findings open a new chapter in the study of habitable exoplanets and the search for extraterrestrial biology.https://hycean.group.cam.ac.uk/Madhusudhan, N., Constantinou, S., Holmberg, M., Sarkar, S., Piette, A. A. A., & Moses, J. I. (2025). New Constraints on DMS and DMDS in the Atmosphere of K2-18 b from JWST MIRI. arXiv preprint arXiv:2504.12267.