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This is a very interesting thing. The article didn't mention anything about how so much carbon was there in the first place. From the article abstract: So it looks like the gas the system coalesced from could have been carbon-rich. I didn't realize there was so much carbon out there.The identification of a carbon-rich super-Earth means that distant rocky planets can no longer be assumed to have chemical constituents, interiors, atmospheres, or biologies similar to those of Earth, Madhusudhan says.
A carbon-rich 55 Cancri e is also plausible if its protoplanetary disk bore the same composition as its host star, which has been reported to be carbon-rich.