Introduction to Cattigagagatta
Cattigagagatta (abbr. Catti) is a panthalassic planet orbiting GJ-1214, a red dwarf star about 47 lightyears from Earth in the constellation Ophiuchus.
Contents
1. Structure
Catti is too big to be called Earth-like, but much too small to qualify as a "gas giant" like Neptune or Uranus. It has a cold, solid iron and silicate core that is slightly larger than the planet Earth. The core is wrapped in a global ocean more than a thousand kilometers deep. The water pressure at the ocean floor is so great that it creates a layer of Ice VII ("hot ice") a kilometer thick. The surface of the great ocean meets a soupy lower atmosphere of water vapor, methane, ammonia, and carbon dioxide so dense that it is hard to be sure where the ocean ends and the atmosphere begins. The upper atmosphere is composed mostly of water vapor, ammonia, and methane saturated with a high density of vaporized salts and metals, resulting in enormous lightning storms that rage continuously around the planet.2. Composition
The ocean that covers Catti is very different from those on earth. Although the average temperature at the ocean's surface is 400 Kelvins (123° Celsius), it does not boil because the atmosphere presses down on it with a force more than ten times the atmospheric pressure on Earth. The result is a hot, dense lower atmosphere that behaves almost like a liquid, blurring the transition to the liquid water ocean. In the upper atmosphere, rolling clouds of vaporized potassium chloride and zinc sulfate block out almost all light from the nearby red dwarf sun and create spectacular triboelectric lightning storms. A high-altitude methane haze protects the atmospheric ammonia against UV photolysis, and prevents much of the heat of the upper-atmosphere from reaching the ocean surface. This keeps the ocean at a moderate temperature, but almost completely blocks out light from the small, red sun.3. Evaluation by Humans
Human scientists do not call the planet "Cattigagagatta" or "Catti," of course. For a long time its only name was GJ-1214b, or sometimes Gliese 1214b. In 2022 CE, the Executive Committee Working Group on Exoplanetary System Nomenclature proposed the name Enaiposha, which is an expression in the Maa language that signifies the tumultuous nature of large bodies of water. In the first decades of the millennium it was common to imagine GJ-1214b as an earth-like planet covered by picturesque rolling seas. Popular science publications tried using cute names like "waterworld" to capture the public imagination. As more facts emerged, however, it became apparent that it was less of a "waterworld" and more of a "steamy swamp planet" or even "superfluid hot mess." Dr. Jacob Bean, an associate professor of astronomy and astrophysics at University of Chicago who studied the planet extensively throughout that time period, said that the planet "has basically no potentiality for habitability." Dr. Bean, however, was wrong.Stellar Data
Designation
Physical Attributes
System Position
Planetary Data
