Exoplanet Cloud Condensation Sequence

Clouds on a hot exoplanet are not water droplets — they are vaporized rock and metal condensing out of the atmosphere. This simulator builds a real pressure–temperature profile for a tidally-locked, irradiated exoplanet atmosphere and layers six condensable species — iron, magnesium silicate, sodium sulfide, potassium chloride, zinc sulfide and water — onto it, each with its own condensation curve. As you raise the equilibrium temperature, steepen the adiabatic lapse rate, change the surface gravity, or dial up the atmospheric metallicity, every cloud deck's altitude and pressure level recomputes live, showing why the hottest gas giants carry deep iron and silicate clouds while only much cooler worlds ever grow a water-cloud deck.