Simulations predict that hot super-Earth sized exoplanets can have their envelopes stripped by photo-evaporation , which would present itself as a lack of these exoplanets .
However , this absence in the exoplanet population has escaped a firm detection .
Here we demonstrate , using asteroseismology on a sample of exoplanets and exoplanet candidates observed during the Kepler mission that , while there is an abundance of super-Earth sized exoplanets with low incident fluxes , none are found with high incident fluxes .
We do not find any exoplanets with radii between \mathbf { 2.2 } and \mathbf { 3.8 } Earth radii with incident flux above \mathbf { 650 } times the incident flux on Earth .
This gap in the population of exoplanets is explained by evaporation of volatile elements and thus supports the predictions .
The confirmation of a hot-super-Earth desert caused by evaporation will add an important constraint on simulations of planetary systems , since they must be able to reproduce the dearth of close-in super-Earths .