I just can’t compute how this is possible. How can a telescope detect a gas, which isn’t even visible to the naked eye, on a planet that is an incomprehensible distance away.
[Source](https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-66786611)
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Think of a [neon sign like this.](https://www.pinterest.com/pin/633600241313896739/) How do they make the different colors?
What’s happening is one of the most approachable parts of a vastly complicated branch of physics called “Quantum Mechanics”. In a very ELI5 explanation – when you give something energy, it glows. Usually things don’t glow so that human eyes can see them, like I’m not glowing at the moment, am I? But wait! There are “infrared goggles” you can wear when I am glowing So every glows if it has energy, including the gases in a planet’s atmosphere.
Back to the neon signs – the elements in the gas and the molecules they form, *glow different colors*. Neon signs glow reddish, argon glows blue/green, etc. Even when we can’t see the colors with our eyes, we can detect them with special cameras.
So that’s what’s happening here, a telescope took a picture of a planet, they matched the colors of the gases to known colors of gases like picking out paint samples at Home Depot. BOOM! We know what gases are in the atmosphere!
Certain gases, like Methane break down pretty quickly in the atmosphere, so without a steady supply there would be very little left. On Earth we have tons and tons of grass eating animals that fart out vast quantities of methane and any alien would be able to instantly know there was life on Earth be seeing the cow-farts.
In a similar we scientists are looking at the planet in your source and seeing other ‘proof of life’ chemicals. Again, not conclusive, but really interesting and promising.
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