Authors:Way et alAbstract:The Kepler era of exoplanetary discovery has presented the Astronomical community with a cornucopia of planetary systems very different from the one which we inhabit. It has long been known that Jupiter plays a major role in the orbital parameters of Mars and it's climate, but there is also a long-standing belief that Jupiter would play a similar role for Earth if not for its large moon. Using a three dimensional general circulation model (3-D GCM) with a fully-coupled ocean we simulate what would happen to the climate of an Earth-like world if Mars did not exist, but a Jupiter-like planet was much closer to Earth's orbit. We investigate two scenarios that involve evolution of the Earth-like planet's orbital eccentricity from 0--0.283 over 6500 years, and from 0--0.066 on a time scale of 4500 years. In both cases we discover that they would maintain relatively temperate climates over the time-scales simulated and that their regional habitability is larger than present day Earth. More Earth-like planets in multi-planet systems will be discovered as we continue to survey the skies and the results herein show that the proximity of large gas giant planets may play an important role in the habitability of these worlds. These are the first such 3-D GCM simulations using a fully-coupled ocean with a planetary orbit that evolves over time due to the presence of a giant planet.
Tuesday, January 31, 2017
Effects of variable eccentricity on the climate of an Earth-like world
EFFECTS OF PROXIMA CENTAURI ON PLANET FORMATION IN ALPHA CENTAURI
Authors:Worth et alAbstract:Proxima Centauri is an M dwarf approximately 15,000 au from the Alpha Centauri binary, comoving and likely in a loosely bound orbit. Dynamic simulations show that this configuration can form from a more tightly bound triple system. As our nearest neighbors, these stars command great interest as potential planet hosts, and the dynamics of the stars govern the formation of any planets within the system. Here we present a scenario for the evolution of Alpha Centauri A and B and Proxima Centauri as a triple system. Based on N-body simulations, we determine that this pathway to formation is plausible, and we quantify the implications for planet formation in the Alpha Centauri binary. We expect that this formation scenario may have truncated the circumstellar disk slightly more than a system that formed in the current configuration, but that it most likely does not prevent terrestrial planet formation. We simulate planet formation in this system and find that, in most scenarios, two or more terrestrial planets can be expected around either Alpha Centauri A or B, orbiting in a region out to approximately 2 au, assuming that planetesimals and planetary embryos are able to form in the system first. Additionally, terrestrial planet formation and stability in Proxima Centauri's habitable zone are also plausible. However, an absence of planets around these stars may be indicative of highly disruptive stellar dynamics in the past.
A super-Earth orbiting the nearby M-dwarf GJ 536
Authors:Suárez Mascareño et alAbstract:We report the discovery of a super-Earth orbiting the star GJ 536 based on the analysis of the radial-velocity time series from the HARPS and HARPS-N spectrographs. GJ 536 b is a planet with a minimum mass M sin i of 5.36 +- 0.69 Me with an orbital period of 8.7076 +- 0.0025 days at a distance of 0.066610(13) AU, and an orbit that is consistent with circular. The host star is the moderately quiet M1 V star GJ 536, located at 10 pc from the Sun. We find the presence of a second signal at 43 days that we relate to stellar rotation after analysing the time series of Ca II H&K and H alpha spectroscopic indicators and photometric data from the ASAS archive. We find no evidence linking the short period signal to any activity proxy. We also tentatively derived a stellar magnetic cycle of less than 3 years.
Monday, January 30, 2017
Binary Systems HD 41004 and HD 196885 Have Trojan Points Capable of Supporting a Habitable Exoplanet
Authors:Schwarz et alAbstract:Approximately 60 percent of all stars in the solar neighbourhood (up to 80 percent in our Milky Way) are members of binary or multiple star systems. This fact led to the speculations that many more planets may exist in binary systems than are currently known. To estimate the habitability of exoplanetary systems, we have to define the so-called habitable zone (HZ). The HZ is defined as a region around a star where a planet would receive enough radiation to maintain liquid water on its surface and to be able to build a stable atmosphere. We search for new dynamical configurations - where planets may stay in stable orbits - to increase the probability to find a planet like the Earth. Therefore we investigated five candidates and found that two systems (HD 41004 and HD 196885) which have small stable regions.
Stochasticity & Predictability in Terrestrial Planet Formation
Authors:Hoffmann et alAbstract:Terrestrial planets are thought to be the result of a vast number of gravitational interactions and collisions between smaller bodies. We use numerical simulations to show that practically identical initial conditions result in a wide array of final planetary configurations. This is a result of the chaotic evolution of trajectories which are highly sensitive to minuscule displacements. We determine that differences between systems evolved from virtually identical initial conditions can be larger than the differences between systems evolved from very different initial conditions. This implies that individual simulations lack predictive power. For example, there is not a reproducible mapping between the initial and final surface density profiles. However, some key global properties can still be extracted if the statistical spread across many simulations is considered. Based on these spreads, we explore the collisional growth and orbital properties of terrestrial planets which assemble from different initial conditions (we vary the initial planetesimal distribution, planetesimal masses, and giant planet orbits). Confirming past work, we find that the resulting planetary systems are sculpted by sweeping secular resonances. Configurations with giant planets on eccentric orbits produce fewer and more massive terrestrial planets on tighter orbits than those with giants on circular orbits. This is further enhanced if the initial mass distribution is biased to the inner regions. In all cases, the outer edge of the system is set by the final location of the ν6 resonance and we find that the mass distribution peaks at the ν5 resonance. Using existing observations, we find that extrasolar systems follow similar trends. Although differences between our numerical modelling and exoplanetary systems remain, we suggest that CoRoT-7, HD 20003, and HD 20781 may host undetected giant planets.
Do planetary seasons play a fundamental role in attaining habitable climates?
Authors:Olsen et alAbstract:A simple phenomenological account for planetary climate instabilities is presented. The description is based on the standard model where the balance of incoming stellar radiation and outward thermal radiation is described by the effective planet temperature. Often, it is found to have three different points, or temperatures, where the influx of radiation is balanced with the out-flux, even with conserved boundary conditions. Two of these points are relatively long-term stable, namely the point corresponding to a frozen-climate and the point corresponding to a hot-climate. The hypothesis promoted in this paper is the possibility that it is the intermediate third point which is the basis for habitable-climates. I.e. that this initially unstable point is made relatively stable over a long period by the presence of seasonal climate variations. This points to the axial inclination, and perhaps the presence of orbital eccentricity, as the origin of the stability of the habitable point. An analysis involving the inclination, the size of the ice caps, and the length of the year shows that within the currently accepted value of the heat capacity of the Earth, the otherwise unstable habitable point is stabilized.
Sunday, January 29, 2017
HOW BRIGHT ARE THE GAPS IN CIRCUMBINARY DISK SYSTEMS?
Authors:Shi et alAbstract:When a circumbinary disk surrounds a binary whose secondary's mass is at least $\sim {10}^{-2}\times $ the primary's mass, a nearly empty cavity with radius a few times the binary separation is carved out of the disk. Narrow streams of material pass from the inner edge of the circumbinary disk into the domain of the binary itself, where they eventually join onto the small disks orbiting the members of the binary. Using data from three-dimensional magnetohydrodynamics simulations of this process, we determine the luminosity of these streams; it is mostly due to weak laminar shocks, and is in general only a few percent of the luminosity of adjacent regions of either the circumbinary disk or the "mini-disks." This luminosity therefore hardly affects the deficit in the thermal continuum predicted on the basis of a perfectly dark gap region.
Proxima's orbit around Alpha Centauri
Authors:Kervella et alAbstract:Proxima and Alpha Centauri AB have almost identical distances and proper motions with respect to the Sun. Although the probability of such similar parameters is in principle very low, the question whether they actually form a single gravitationally bound triple system has been open since the discovery of Proxima one century ago. Owing to recent high precision radial velocity measurements and the revision of the parameters of the Alpha Cen pair, we show that Proxima and Alpha Cen are gravitationally bound with a high degree of confidence. The orbital period of Proxima is approximately 600 000 years, with a moderate excentricity of 0.42 +0.07 -0.08. Proxima comes within 5.3 -0.9 +1.2 kAU of Alpha Cen at periastron, and the apastron occurs at 12.9 +0.3 -0.1 kAU. This orbital motion may have influenced the formation or evolution of the recently discovered planet orbiting Proxima as well as circumbinary planet formation around Alpha Cen.
Planet signatures in the chemical composition of Sun-like stars
Authors:Melendez et alAbstract:There are two possible mechanisms to imprint planet signatures in the chemical composition of Sun-like stars: i) dust condensation at the early stages of planet formation, causing a depletion of refractory elements in the gas accreted by the star in the late stages of its formation; ii) planet engulfment, enriching the host star in lithium and refractory elements. We discuss both planet signatures, the influence of galactic chemical evolution, and the importance of binaries composed of stellar twins as laboratories to verify abundance anomalies imprinted by planets.
Saturday, January 28, 2017
EXPERIMENTAL INVESTIGATION OF IRRADIATION-DRIVEN HYDROGEN ISOTOPE FRACTIONATION IN ANALOGS OF PROTOPLANETARY HYDROUS SILICATE DUST
EXPERIMENTAL INVESTIGATION OF IRRADIATION-DRIVEN HYDROGEN ISOTOPE FRACTIONATION IN ANALOGS OF PROTOPLANETARY HYDROUS SILICATE DUST
Authors:
Roskosz et al
Abstract:
The origin of hydrogen in chondritic components is poorly understood. Their isotopic composition is heavier than the solar nebula gas. In addition, in most meteorites, hydrous silicates are found to be lighter than the coexisting organic matter. Ionizing irradiation recently emerged as an efficient hydrogen fractionating process in organics, but its effect on H-bearing silicates remains essentially unknown. We report the evolution of the D/H of hydrous silicates experimentally irradiated by electrons. Thin films of amorphous silica, amorphous "serpentine," and pellets of crystalline muscovite were irradiated at 4 and 30 keV. For all samples, irradiation leads to a large hydrogen loss correlated with a moderate deuterium enrichment of the solid residue. The entire data set can be described by a Rayleigh distillation. The calculated fractionation factor is consistent with a kinetically controlled fractionation during the loss of hydrogen. Furthermore, for a given ionizing condition, the deuteration of the silicate residues is much lower than the deuteration measured on irradiated organic macromolecules. These results provide firm evidence of the limitations of ionizing irradiation as a driving mechanism for D-enrichment of silicate materials. The isotopic composition of the silicate dust cannot rise from a protosolar to a chondritic signature during solar irradiations. More importantly, these results imply that irradiation of the disk naturally induces a strong decoupling of the isotopic signatures of coexisting organics and silicates. This decoupling is consistent with the systematic difference observed between the heavy organic matter and the lighter water typically associated with minerals in the matrix of most carbonaceous chondrites.
CoRoT 223992193: Investigating the variability in a low-mass, pre-main sequence eclipsing binary with evidence of a circumbinary disk
Authors:Gillen et alAbstract:CoRoT 223992193 is the only known low-mass, pre-main sequence eclipsing binary that shows evidence of a circumbinary disk. The system displays complex photometric and spectroscopic variability over a range of timescales and wavelengths. Using two optical CoRoT runs, and infrared Spitzer 3.6 and 4.5 μm observations (simultaneous with the second CoRoT run), we model the out-of-eclipse light curves. The large scale structure in both CoRoT light curves is consistent with the constructive and destructive interference of starspot signals at two slightly different periods. Using the stellar vsini 's, we infer different rotation periods: the primary is consistent with synchronisation and the secondary is slightly supersynchronous. Comparison of the raw data to the residuals of our spot model in colour-magnitude space indicates additional contributions consistent with variable dust emission and obscuration. We also identify short-duration flux dips preceding secondary eclipse in all three CoRoT and Spitzer bands. We construct a model of the inner regions of the binary and propose that these dips could be caused by partial occultation of the central binary by the accretion stream onto the primary star. Analysis of 15 VLT/FLAMES Hα profiles reveal an emission profile associated with each star: the majority is consistent with chromospheric emission but higher velocity emission is also seen, which could be due to prominences or accretion-related phenomena. In addition, simultaneous u and r-band observations from CFHT/MEGACam reveal a short-lived u-band excess consistent with either an accretion hot spot or stellar flare. The photometric and spectroscopic variations are complex but are consistent with the picture of two active stars possibly undergoing non-steady, low-level accretion; the system's very high inclination provides a new view of such variability.
Radial Drift of Dust in Protoplanetary Disks: The Evolution of Ice lines and Dead zones
Authors:Cridland et alAbstract:We have developed a new model for the astrochemical structure of a viscously evolving protoplanetary disk that couples an analytic description of the disk's temperature and density profile, chemical evolution, and an evolving dust distribution. We compute evolving radial distributions for a range of dust grain sizes, which depend on coagulation, fragmentation and radial drift processes. In particular we find that the water ice line plays an important role in shaping the radial distribution of the maximum grain size because ice coated grains are significantly less susceptible to fragmentation than their dry counterparts. This in turn has important effects on disk ionization and therefore on the location of dead zones. In comparison to a simple constant gas-to-dust ratio model for the dust as an example, we find that the new model predicts an outer dead zone edge that moves in by a factor of about 3 at 1 Myr (to 5 AU) and by a factor of about 14 by 3 Myr (to 0.5 AU). We show that the changing position of the dead zone and heat transition traps have important implications for the formation and trapping of planets in protoplanetary disks. Finally, we consider our results in light of recent ALMA observations of HL Tau and TW Hya.
Friday, January 27, 2017
EPIC 219388192B: a hot Brown Dwarfin a 5.3 day Orbit
Authors:Nowak et alAbstract:We report the discovery of EPIC 219388192 b, a transiting brown dwarf in a 5.3-day orbit around a member star of Ruprecht-147, the oldest nearby open cluster association, which was photometrically monitored by K2 during its Campaign 7. We combine the K2 time-series data with ground-based adaptive optics imaging and high resolution spectroscopy to rule out false positive scenarios and determine the main parameters of the system. EPIC 219388192 b has a radius of Rb=0.937±0.042~RJup and mass of Mb=36.50±0.09~MJup, yielding a mean density of 59.0±8.1~gcm−3. The host star is nearly a Solar twin with mass M⋆=0.99±0.05~M⊙, radius R⋆=1.01±0.04~R⊙, effective temperature Teff=5850±85~K and iron abundance [Fe/H]=0.03±0.08~dex. Its age, spectroscopic distance, and reddening are consistent with those of Ruprecht-147, corroborating its cluster membership. EPIC 219388192 b is the first brown dwarf with precise determinations of mass, radius and age, and serves as benchmark for evolutionary models in the sub-stellar regime.
First Simultaneous Observation of a Microlensing Event Finds a Brown Dwarf
Authors:Shvartzvald et alAbstract:Simultaneous observations of microlensing events from multiple locations allow for the breaking of degeneracies between the physical properties of the lensing system, specifically by exploring different regions of the lens plane and by directly measuring the "microlens parallax." We report the discovery of a 30–65M J brown dwarf orbiting a K dwarf in the microlensing event OGLE-2015-BLG-1319. The system is located at a distance of ~5 kpc toward the Galactic Bulge. The event was observed by several ground-based groups as well as by Spitzer and Swift, allowing a measurement of the physical properties. However, the event is still subject to an eight-fold degeneracy, in particular the well-known close-wide degeneracy, and thus the projected separation between the two lens components is either ~0.25 au or ~45 au. This is the first microlensing event observed by Swift, with the UVOT camera. We study the region of microlensing parameter space to which Swift is sensitive, finding that though Swift could not measure the microlens parallax with respect to ground-based observations for this event, it can be important for other events. Specifically, it is important for detecting nearby brown dwarfs and free-floating planets in high magnification events.
Characterizing Proto Brown Dwarfs in Serpens
Authors:Riaz et alAbstract:We present results from a deep submillimeter survey in the Serpens Main and Serpens/G3–G6 clusters, conducted with the Submillimetre Common-User Bolometer Array (SCUBA-2) at the James Clerk Maxwell Telescope. We have combined near- and mid-infrared spectroscopy, Herschel PACS far-infrared photometry, submillimeter continuum, and molecular gas line observations, with the aim of conducting a detailed multiwavelength characterization of "proto-brown-dwarf" (proto-BD) candidates in Serpens. We have performed continuum and line radiative transfer modeling and have considered various classification schemes to understand the structure and the evolutionary stage of the system. We have identified four proto-BD candidates, of which the lowest-luminosity source has an L bol ~ 0.05 L ☉. Two of these candidates show characteristics consistent with Stage 0/I systems, while the other two are Stage I-T/Class Flat systems with tenuous envelopes. Our work has also revealed a ~20% fraction of misidentified Class 0/I/Flat sources that show characteristics consistent with Class II edge-on disk systems. We have set constraints on the mass of the central object using the measured bolometric luminosities and numerical simulations of stellar evolution. Considering the available gas+dust mass reservoir and the current mass of the central source, three of these candidates are likely to evolve into BDs.
Thursday, January 26, 2017
Hot Jupiter WASP-20b is Really in a Binary Star System
Authors:Evans et alAbstract:We announce the discovery that WASP-20 is a binary stellar system, consisting of two components separated by 0.2578±0.0007′′ on the sky, with a flux ratio of 0.4639±0.0015 in the K-band. It has previously been assumed that the system consists of a single F9 V star, with photometric and radial velocity signals consistent with a low-density transiting giant planet. With a projected separation of approximately 60 au between the two components, the detected planetary signals almost certainly originate from the brighter of the two stars. We reanalyse previous observations allowing for two scenarios, `planet transits A' and `planet transits B', finding that both cases remain consistent with a transiting gas giant. However, we rule out the `planet transits B' scenario because the observed transit duration requires star B to be significantly evolved, and therefore have an age much greater than star A. We outline further observations which can be used to confirm this finding. Our preferred `planet transits A' scenario results in the measured mass and radius of the planet increasing by 4σ and 1σ, respectively.
High-temperature condensate clouds in super-hot Jupiter atmospheres
Authors:Wakeford et alAbstract:Deciphering the role of clouds is central to our understanding of exoplanet atmospheres, as they have a direct impact on the temperature and pressure structure, and observational properties of the planet. Super-hot Jupiters occupy a temperature regime similar to low-mass M-dwarfs, where minimal cloud condensation is expected. However, observations of exoplanets such as WASP-12b (Teq ∼ 2500 K) result in a transmission spectrum indicative of a cloudy atmosphere. We re-examine the temperature and pressure space occupied by these super-hot Jupiter atmospheres, to explore the role of the initial Al- and Ti-bearing condensates as the main source of cloud material. Due to the high temperatures, a majority of the more common refractory material is not depleted into deeper layers and would remain in the vapour phase. The lack of depletion into deeper layers means that these materials with relatively low cloud masses can become significant absorbers in the upper atmosphere. We provide condensation curves for the initial Al- and Ti-bearing condensates which may be used to provide quantitative estimates of the effect of metallicity on cloud masses, as planets with metal-rich hosts potentially form more opaque clouds because more mass is available for condensation. Increased metallicity also pushes the point of condensation to hotter, deeper layers in the planetary atmosphere further increasing the density of the cloud. We suggest that planets around metal-rich hosts are more likely to have thick refractory clouds, and discuss the implication on the observed spectra of WASP-12b.
The Origin and Orbital Resonances of the Kepler-29 System
Authors:Migaszewski et alAbstract:We analyse the Transit Timing Variation (TTV) measurements of a~system of two super-Earths detected as Kepler-29, in order to constrain the planets' masses and orbital parameters. A dynamical analysis of the best-fitting configurations constrains the masses to be ∼5 and ∼6 Earth masses for the inner and the outer planets, respectively. The analysis also reveals that the system is likely locked in the 9:7~mean motion resonance. However, a variety of orbital architectures regarding eccentricities and the relative orientation of orbits is permitted by the observations as well as by stability constraints. We attempt to find configurations preferred by the planet formation scenarios as an additional, physical constraint. We show that configurations with low eccentricities and anti-aligned apsidal lines of the orbits are a natural and most likely outcome of the convergent migration. However, we show that librations of the critical angles are not necessary for the Kepler-29 system to be dynamically resonant, and such configurations may be formed on the way of migration as well. We argue, on the other hand, that aligned configurations with e≳0.03 may be not consistent with the migration scenario.
Wednesday, January 25, 2017
FU Orionis outbursts, preferential recondensation of water ice, and the formation of giant planets
FU Orionis outbursts, preferential recondensation of water ice, and the formation of giant planetsAuthor:HubbardAbstract:Ices, including water ice, prefer to recondense onto pre-existing nuclei rather than spontaneously forming grains from a cloud of vapor. Interestingly, different potential recondensation nuclei have very different propensities to actually nucleate water ice at the temperatures associated with freeze-out in protoplanetary discs. Therefore, if a region in a disc is warmed and then recooled, water vapor should not be expected to refreeze evenly onto all available grains. Instead it will preferentially recondense onto the most favorable grains. When the recooling is slow enough, only the most favorable grains will nucleate ice, allowing them to recondense thick ice mantles. We quantify the conditions for preferential recondensation to rapidly create pebble-sized grains in protoplanetary discs and show that FU Orionis type outbursts have the appropriate cooling rates to drive pebble creation in a band about 5 astronomical units wide outside of the quiescent frost line from approximately Jupiter's orbit to Saturn's (about 4 to 10 au). Those pebbles could be of the appropriate size to proceed to planetesimal formation via the Streaming Instability, or to contribute to the growth of planetesimals through pebble accretion. We suggest that this phenomenon contributed to the formation of the gas giants in our own Solar System.
Are a Chain of Nemesis Class Exoplanets Scattering Comets Inwards in the η Corvi System?
Authors:Marino et alAbstract:While most of the known debris discs present cold dust at tens of AU, a few young systems exhibit hot dust analogous to the Zodiacal dust. η Corvi is particularly interesting as it is old and it has both, with its hot dust significantly exceeding the maximum luminosity of an in-situ collisional cascade. Previous work suggested that this system could be undergoing an event similar to the Late Heavy Bombardment (LHB) soon after or during a dynamical instability. Here we present ALMA observations of η Corvi with a resolution of 1."2 (~22au) to study its outer belt. The continuum emission is consistent with an axisymmetric belt, with a mean radius of 152au and radial FWHM of 46au, which is too narrow compared to models of inward scattering of an LHB-like scenario. Instead, the hot dust could be explained as material passed inwards in a rather stable planetary configuration. We also report a 4sigma detection of CO at ~ 20au. CO could be released in situ from icy planetesimals being passed in when crossing the H2O or CO2 ice lines. Finally, we place constraints on hidden planets in the disc. If a planet is sculpting the disc's inner edge, this should be orbiting at 75-100au, with a mass of 3-30 M⊕ and an eccentricity < 0.08. Such a planet would be able to clear its chaotic zone on a timescale shorter than the age of the system and scatter material inwards from the outer belt to the inner regions, thus feeding the hot dust.
Atmospheric Signatures of Giant Exoplanet Formation by Pebble Accretion
Authors:Madhusudhan et alAbstract:Atmospheric chemical abundances of giant planets lead to important constraints on planetary formation and migration. Recent studies have shown that giant planets that migrate through the protoplanetary disk can accrete substantial amounts of oxygen-rich solids, leading to super-solar metallicities in the envelope and solar or sub-solar C/O ratios. Pebble accretion has been demonstrated recently to play an important role in core accretion and to have growth rates that are consistent with planetary migration. The high pebble accretion rates allow planetary cores to start their growth beyond 10 AU and subsequently migrate to cold (>~ 1 AU) or hot (<~ 0.1 AU) orbits. In this work we investigate how the formation of giant planets via pebble accretion influences their atmospheric chemical compositions. We find that under the standard pebble accretion scenario, where the core is isolated from the envelope, the resulting metallicities (O/H and C/H ratios) are sub-solar, while the C/O ratios are super-solar. Planets that migrate through the disk to become hot Jupiters accrete substantial amounts of water vapour, but still acquire slightly sub-solar O/H and super-solar C/O of 0.7-0.8. The metallicity can be substantially sub-solar (~0.2-0.5x solar) and the C/O can even approach 1.0 if the planet accretes its envelope mostly beyond the CO2 ice line, i.e. cold Jupiters or hot Jupiters that form far out and migrate in by scattering. Allowing for core erosion yields significantly super-solar metallicities and solar or sub-solar C/O, which can also be achieved by other means, e.g. photoevaporation and late-stage planetesimal accretion.
Tuesday, January 24, 2017
The circulation pattern and day-night heat transport in the atmosphere of a synchronously rotating aquaplanet
Authors:Noda et alAbstract:In order to investigate a possible variety of atmospheric states realized on a synchronously rotating aquaplanet, an experiment studying the impact of planetary rotation rate is performed using an atmospheric general circulation model (GCM) with simplified hydrological and radiative processes. The entire planetary surface is covered with a swamp ocean. The value of planetary rotation rate is varied from zero to the Earth’s, while other parameters such as planetary radius, mean molecular weight and total mass of atmospheric dry components, and solar constant are set to the present Earth’s values. The integration results show that the atmosphere reaches statistically equilibrium states for all runs; none of the calculated cases exemplifies the runaway greenhouse state. The circulation patterns obtained are classified into four types: Type-I characterized by the dominance of a day-night thermally direct circulation, Type-II characterized by a zonal wave number one resonant Rossby wave over a meridionally broad westerly jet on the equator, Type-III characterized by a long time scale north-south asymmetric variation, and Type-IV characterized by a pair of mid-latitude westerly jets. With the increase of planetary rotation rate, the circulation evolves from Type-I to Type-II and then to Type-III gradually and smoothly, whereas the change from Type-III to Type-IV is abrupt and discontinuous. Over a finite range of planetary rotation rate, both Types-III and -IV emerge as statistically steady states, constituting multiple equilibria. In spite of the substantial changes in circulation, the net energy transport from the day side to the night side remains almost insensitive to planetary rotation rate, although the partition into dry static energy and latent heat energy transports changes. The reason for this notable insensitivity is that the outgoing longwave radiation over the broad area of the day side is constrained by the radiation limit of a moist atmosphere, so that the transport to the night side, which is determined as the difference between the incoming solar radiation and the radiation limit, cannot change greatly.
Kepler Planet Masses and Eccentricities from Transit TIming Variation Analysis
Authors:Hadden et alAbstract:We conduct a uniform analysis of the transit timing variations (TTVs) of 145 planets from 55 Kepler multiplanet systems to infer planet masses and eccentricities. Eighty of these planets do not have previously reported mass and eccentricity measurements. We employ two complementary methods to fit TTVs: Markov chain Monte Carlo simulations based on N-body integration and an analytic fitting approach. Mass measurements of 49 planets, including 12 without previously reported masses, meet our criterion for classification as robust. Using mass and radius measurements, we infer the masses of planets' gaseous envelopes for both our TTV sample as well as transiting planets with radial velocity observations. Insight from analytic TTV formulae allows us to partially circumvent degeneracies inherent to inferring eccentricities from TTV observations. We find that planet eccentricities are generally small, typically a few percent, but in many instances are non-zero.
Exo-Transmit: An Open-Source Code for Calculating Transmission Spectra for Exoplanet Atmospheres of Varied Composition
Authors:Kempton et alAbstract:We present Exo-Transmit, a software package to calculate exoplanet transmission spectra for planets of varied composition. The code is designed to generate spectra of planets with a wide range of atmospheric composition, temperature, surface gravity, and size, and is therefore applicable to exoplanets ranging in mass and size from hot Jupiters down to rocky super-Earths. Spectra can be generated with or without clouds or hazes with options to (1) include an optically thick cloud deck at a user-specified atmospheric pressure or (2) to augment the nominal Rayleigh scattering by a user-specified factor. The Exo-Transmit code is written in C and is extremely easy to use. Typically the user will only need to edit parameters in a single user input file in order to run the code for a planet of their choosing. Exo-Transmit is available publicly on Github with open-source licensing at this https URL .
Monday, January 23, 2017
Rocky Planetesimal Formation via Fluffy Aggregates of Nanograins
Authors:Arakawa et alAbstract:Several pieces of evidence suggest that silicate grains in primitive meteorites are not interstellar grains but condensates formed in the early solar system. Moreover, the size distribution of matrix grains in chondrites implies that these condensates might be formed as nanometer-sized grains. Therefore, we propose a novel scenario for rocky planetesimal formation in which nanometer-sized silicate grains are produced by evaporation and recondensation events in early solar nebula, and rocky planetesimals are formed via aggregation of these nanograins. We reveal that silicate nanograins can grow into rocky planetesimals via direct aggregation without catastrophic fragmentation and serious radial drift, and our results provide a suitable condition for protoplanet formation in our solar system.
Habitable Exoplanets Most Likely Survive Gamma Ray Bursts
Author:GowanlockAbstract:A planet having protective ozone within the collimated beam of a gamma-ray burst (GRB) may suffer ozone depletion, potentially causing a mass extinction event to existing life on a planet's surface and oceans. We model the dangers of long GRBs to planets in the Milky Way and utilize a static statistical model of the Galaxy, which matches major observable properties, such as the inside-out star formation history (SFH), metallicity evolution, and three-dimensional stellar number density distribution. The GRB formation rate is a function of both the SFH and metallicity. However, the extent to which chemical evolution reduces the GRB rate over time in the Milky Way is still an open question. Therefore, we compare the damaging effects of GRBs to biospheres in the Milky Way using two models. One model generates GRBs as a function of the inside-out SFH. The other model follows the SFH, but generates GRB progenitors as a function of metallicity, thereby favoring metal-poor host regions of the Galaxy over time. If the GRB rate only follows the SFH, the majority of the GRBs occur in the inner Galaxy. However, if GRB progenitors are constrained to low-metallicity environments, then GRBs only form in the metal-poor outskirts at recent epochs. Interestingly, over the past 1 Gyr, the surface density of stars (and their corresponding planets), which survive a GRB is still greatest in the inner galaxy in both models. The present-day danger of long GRBs to life at the solar radius (R ⊙ = 8 kpc) is low. We find that at least ~65% of stars survive a GRB over the past 1 Gyr. Furthermore, when the GRB rate was expected to have been enhanced at higher redshifts, such as z gsim 0.5, our results suggest that a large fraction of planets would have survived these lethal GRB events.
The rotation of planets hosting atmospheric tides: from Venus to habitable super-earths
Authors:Auclair-Desrotour et alAbstract:The competition between the torques induced by solid and thermal tides drives the rotational dynamics of Venus-like planets and super-Earths orbiting in the habitable zone of low-mass stars. The tidal responses of the atmosphere and telluric core are related to their respective physical properties and strongly depend on the tidal frequency. The resulting torque determines the possible equilibrium states of the planet's spin. We compute here an analytic expression for the total tidal torque exerted on a Venus-like planet. This expression is used to characterize the equilibrium rotation of the body. Close to the star, the solid tide dominates. Far from it, the thermal tide drives the rotational dynamics of the planet. The transition regime corresponds to the habitable zone, where prograde and retrograde equilibrium states appear. We demonstrate the strong impact of the atmospheric properties and of the rheology of the solid part on the rotational dynamics of Venus-like planets, highlighting the key role played by dissipative mechanisms in the stability of equilibrium configurations.
Sunday, January 22, 2017
Long-Lived Dust Asymmetries at Dead Zone Edges in Protoplanetary Disks
Authors:Miranda et alAbstract:A number of transition disks exhibit significant azimuthal asymmetries in thermal dust emission. One possible origin for these asymmetries is dust trapping in vortices formed at the edges of dead zones. We carry out high resolution hydroydnamic simulations of this scenario, including the effects of dust feedback. We find that, although feedback weakens the vortices and slows down the process of dust accumulation, the dust distribution in the disk can nonetheless remain asymmetric for many thousands of orbits. We show that even after 104 orbits, a significant fraction of a disk lifetime, the dust is not dispersed into an axisymmetric ring, in contrast to the case of a vortex formed by a planet. This is because accumulation of mass at the dead zone edge constantly replenishes the vortex, preventing it from being fully destroyed. We produce synthetic dust emission images using our simulation results. We find that multiple small clumps of dust may be distributed azimuthally. These clumps, if not resolved from one another, appear as a single large feature. A defining characteristic of a disk with a dead zone edge is that an asymmetric feature is accompanied by a ring of dust located about twice as far from the central star.
Stacking Spectra in Protoplanetary Disks: Detecting Intensity Profiles from Hidden Molecular Lines in HD 163296
Stacking Spectra in Protoplanetary Disks: Detecting Intensity Profiles from Hidden Molecular Lines in HD 163296
Authors:
Yen et al
Abstract:
We introduce a new stacking method in Keplerian disks that (1) enhances signal-to-noise ratios (S/N) of detected molecular lines and (2) that makes visible otherwise undetectable weak lines. Our technique takes advantage of the Keplerian rotational velocity pattern. It aligns spectra according to their different centroid velocities at their different positions in a disk and stacks them. After aligning, the signals are accumulated in a narrower velocity range as compared to the original line width without alignment. Moreover, originally correlated noise becomes de-correlated. Stacked and aligned spectra, thus, have a higher S/N. We apply our method to ALMA archival data of DCN (3-2), DCO+ (3-2), N2D+ (3-2), and H2CO (3_0,3-2_0,2), (3_2,2-2_2,1), and (3_2,1-2_2,0) in the protoplanetary disk around HD 163296. As a result, (1) the S/N of the originally detected DCN (3-2), DCO+ (3-2), and H2CO (3_0,3-2_0,2) and N2D+ (3-2) lines are boosted by a factor of greater than 4-5 at their spectral peaks, implying one order of magnitude shorter integration times to reach the original S/N; and (2) the previously undetectable spectra of the H2CO (3_2,2-2_2,1) and (3_2,1-2_2,0) lines are materialized at more than 3 sigma. These dramatically enhanced S/N allow us to measure intensity distributions in all lines with high significance. The principle of our method can not only be applied to Keplerian disks but also to any systems with ordered kinematic patterns.
Slowly-growing gap-opening planets trigger weaker vortices
Authors:Hammer et alAbstract:The presence of a giant planet in a low-viscosity disc can create a gap edge in the disc's radial density profile sharp enough to excite the Rossby Wave Instability. This instability may evolve into dust-trapping vortices that might explain the "banana-shaped" features in recently observed asymmetric transition discs with inner cavities. Previous hydrodynamical simulations of planet-induced vortices have neglected the timescale of hundreds to thousands of orbits to grow a massive planet to Jupiter-size. In this work, we study the effect of a giant planet's runaway growth timescale on the lifetime and characteristics of the resulting vortex. For two different planet masses (1 and 5 Jupiter masses) and two different disc viscosities (α=3×10−4 and 3×10−5), we compare the vortices induced by planets with several different growth timescales between 10 and 4000 planet orbits. In general, we find that slowly-growing planets create significantly weaker vortices with lifetimes and surface densities reduced by more than 50%. For the higher disc viscosity, the longest growth timescales in our study inhibit vortex formation altogether. Additionally, slowly-growing planets produce vortices that are up to twice as elongated, with azimuthal extents well above 180∘ in some cases. These unique, elongated vortices likely create a distinct signature in the dust observations that differentiates them from the more concentrated vortices that correspond to planets with faster growth timescales. We find that the low viscosities necessary for vortex formation likely prevent planets from growing quickly enough to trigger the instability in self-consistent models.
Saturday, January 21, 2017
Explorations of Dusty Debris Disk Geometry
Authors:Dennihy et alAbstract:As the sample of white dwarfs with signatures of planetary systems has grown, statistical studies have begun to suggest our picture of compact debris disk formation from disrupted planetary bodies is incomplete. Here we present the results of an effort to extend the preferred dust disk model introduced by \citet{jur03} to include elliptical geometries. We apply this model the observed distribution of fractional infrared luminosities, and explore the difference in preferred parameter spaces for a circular and highly elliptical model on a well-studied dusty white dwarf.
Scattered light mapping of protoplanetary disks
Authors:Stolker et alAbstract:High-contrast scattered light observations have revealed the surface morphology of several dozens of protoplanetary disks at optical and near-infrared wavelengths. Inclined disks offer the opportunity to measure part of the phase function of the dust grains that reside in the disk surface which is essential for our understanding of protoplanetary dust properties and the early stages of planet formation. We aim to construct a method which takes into account how the flaring shape of the scattering surface of an (optically thick) protoplanetary disk projects onto the image plane of the observer. This allows us to map physical quantities (scattering radius and scattering angle) onto scattered light images and retrieve stellar irradiation corrected (r^2-scaled) images and dust phase functions. We apply the method on archival polarized intensity images of the protoplanetary disk around HD 100546 that were obtained with VLT/SPHERE in R'-band and VLT/NACO in H- and Ks-band. The brightest side of the r^2-scaled R'-band polarized intensity image of HD 100546 changes from the far to the near side of the disk when a flaring instead of a geometrically flat disk surface is used for the r^2-scaling. The decrease in polarized surface brightness in the scattering angle range of ~40-70 deg is likely a result of the dust phase function and degree of polarization which peak in different scattering angle regimes. The derived phase functions show part of a forward scattering peak which indicates that large, aggregate dust grains dominate the scattering opacity in the disk surface. Projection effects of a protoplanetary disk surface need to be taken into account to correctly interpret scattered light images. Applying the correct scaling for the correction of stellar irradiation is crucial for the interpretation of the images and the derivation of the dust properties in the disk surface layer.
Radial decoupling of small and large dust grains in the transitional disk RX J1615.3-3255
Authors:Kooistra et alAbstract:We present H-band (1.6 {\mu}m) scattered light observations of the transitional disk RX J1615.3-3255, located in the ~1 Myr old Lupus association. From a polarized intensity image, taken with the HiCIAO instrument of the Subaru Telescope, we deduce the position angle and the inclination angle of the disk. The disk is found to extend out to 68 ± 12 AU in scattered light and no clear structure is observed. Our inner working angle of 24 AU does not allow us to detect a central decrease in intensity similar to that seen at 30 AU in the 880 {\mu}m continuum observations. We compare the observations with multiple disk models based on the Spectral Energy Distribution (SED) and submm interferometry and find that an inner rim of the outer disk at 30 AU containing small silicate grains produces a polarized intensity signal which is an order of magnitude larger than observed. We show that a model in which the small dust grains extend smoothly into the cavity found for large grains is closer to the actual H-band observations. A comparison of models with different dust size distributions suggests that the dust in the disk might have undergone significant processing compared to the interstellar medium.
Friday, January 20, 2017
L Class Brown Dwarf EPIC 220186653 had a Superflare
Authors:Gizis et alAbstract:We report on K2 Campaign 8 measurements of a huge white light flare on the L1 dwarf SDSSp J005406.55-003101.8 (EPIC 220186653). The source is a typical L1 dwarf at a distance of ∼50 pc, probably an old hydrogen-burning star rather than a young brown dwarf. In the long (30-minute) cadence photometry, the flare peak is 21 times the flux of the stellar photosphere in the broad optical Kepler filter, which we estimate corresponds to ΔV≈−7.1. The total equivalent duration of the flare is 15.4 hr. We estimate the total bolometric energy of the flare was 4×1033 erg, more powerful that the previously reported Kepler white light flares for the L1 dwarf WISEP J190648.47+401106.8, but weaker than the ΔV=−11 L0 dwarf superflare ASASSN-16ae. The initial (impulsive) cooling phase is too rapid to resolve with our 30-minute cadence data, but after one hour the gradual cooling phase has an exponential time constant of 1.8 hours. We use template fitting to estimate that the full-time-width-at-half-amplitude of the light curve is
2MASS J22362452+4751425B: A Planetary Mass Brown Dwarf?
Planets Around Low-Mass Stars (PALMS). VI. Discovery of a Remarkably Red Planetary-Mass Companion to the AB Dor Moving Group Candidate 2MASS J22362452+4751425Authors:Bowler et alAbstract:We report the discovery of an extremely red planetary-mass companion to 2MASS J22362452+4751425, a ≈0.6 M⊙ late-K dwarf likely belonging to the ∼120 Myr AB Doradus moving group. 2M2236+4751 b was identified in multi-epoch NIRC2 adaptive optics imaging at Keck Observatory at a separation of 3.7", or 230 ± 20 AU in projection at the kinematic distance of 63 ± 5 pc to its host star. Assuming membership in the AB Dor group, as suggested from its kinematics, the inferred mass of 2M2236+4751 b is 11-14 MJup. Follow-up Keck/OSIRIS K-band spectroscopy of the companion reveals strong CO absorption similar to other faint red L dwarfs and lacks signs of methane absorption despite having an effective temperature of ≈900-1200 K. With a (J-K)MKO color of 2.69 ± 0.12 mag, the near-infrared slope of 2M2236+4751 b is redder than all of the HR 8799 planets and instead resembles the ≈23 Myr isolated planetary-mass object PSO J318.5-22, implying that similarly thick photospheric clouds can persist in the atmospheres of giant planets at ages beyond 100 Myr. In near-infrared color-magnitude diagrams, 2M2236+4751 b is located at the tip of the red L dwarf sequence and appears to define the "elbow" of the AB Dor substellar isochrone separating low-gravity L dwarfs from the cooler young T dwarf track. 2M2236+4751 b is the reddest substellar companion to a star and will be a valuable benchmark to study the shared atmospheric properties of young low-mass brown dwarfs and extrasolar giant planets.
Treatment of overlapping gaseous absorption with the correlated-k method in hot Jupiter and brown dwarf atmosphere models
Authors:Amundsen et alAbstract:The correlated-k method is frequently used to speed up radiation calculations in both one-dimensional and three-dimensional atmosphere models. An inherent difficulty with this method is how to treat overlapping absorption, i.e. absorption by more than one gas in a given spectral region. We have evaluated the applicability of three different methods in hot Jupiter and brown dwarf atmosphere models, all of which have been previously applied within models in the literature: (i) Random overlap, both with and without resorting and rebinning, (ii) equivalent extinction and (iii) pre-mixing of opacities, where (i) and (ii) combine k-coefficients for different gases to obtain k-coefficients for a mixture of gases, while (iii) calculates k-coefficients for a given mixture from the corresponding mixed line-by-line opacities. We find that the random overlap method is the most accurate and flexible of these treatments, and is fast enough to be used in one-dimensional models with resorting and rebinning. In three-dimensional models such as GCMs it is too slow, however, and equivalent extinction can provide a speed-up of at least a factor of three with only a minor loss of accuracy while at the same time retaining the flexibility gained by combining k-coefficients computed for each gas individually. Pre-mixed opacities are significantly less flexible, and we also find that particular care must be taken when using this method in order to to adequately resolve steep variations in composition at important chemical equilibrium boundaries. We use the random overlap method with resorting and rebinning in our one-dimensional atmosphere model and equivalent extinction in our GCM, which allows us to e.g. consistently treat the feedback of non-equilibrium chemistry on the total opacity and therefore the calculated P-T profiles in our models.
Thursday, January 19, 2017
Thermal Spectrum of the Non-Transiting Hot Jupiter HD 88133b
Authors:Piskorz et alAbstract:We target the thermal emission spectrum of the non-transiting gas giant HD 88133 b with high-resolution near-infrared spectroscopy, by treating the planet and its host star as a spectroscopic binary. For sufficiently deep summed flux observations of the star and planet across multiple epochs, it is possible to resolve the signal of the hot gas giant's atmosphere compared to the brighter stellar spectrum, at a level consistent with the aggregate shot noise of the full data set. To do this, we first perform a principal component analysis to remove the contribution of the Earth's atmosphere to the observed spectra. Then, we use a cross-correlation analysis to tease out the spectra of the host star and HD 88133 b to determine its orbit and identify key sources of atmospheric opacity. In total, six epochs of Keck NIRSPEC L band observations and three epochs of Keck NIRSPEC K band observations of the HD 88133 system were obtained. Based on an analysis of the maximum likelihood curves calculated from the multi-epoch cross correlation of the full data set with two atmospheric models, we report the direct detection of the emission spectrum of the non-transiting exoplanet HD 88133 b and measure a radial projection of the Keplerian orbital velocity of 40 ± 15 km/s, a true mass of 1.02+0.61−0.28MJ, a nearly face-on orbital inclination of 15+6−5∘, and an atmosphere opacity structure at high dispersion dominated by water vapor. This, combined with eleven years of radial velocity measurements of the system, provides the most up-to-date ephemeris for HD 88133.
Sodium Detected in the Atmosphere of hot Jupiter WASP-39b by Ground Based Telescope
Authors:Nikolov et alAbstract:We present transmission spectroscopy of the warm Saturn-mass exoplanet WASP-39b made with the Very Large Telescope (VLT) FOcal Reducer and Spectrograph (FORS2) across the wavelength range 411-810nm. The transit depth is measured with a typical precision of 240 parts per million (ppm) in wavelength bins of 10nm on a V = 12.1 magnitude star. We detect the sodium absorption feature (3.2-sigma) and find evidence for potassium. The ground-based transmission spectrum is consistent with Hubble Space Telescope (HST) optical spectroscopy, strengthening the interpretation of WASP-39b having a largely clear atmosphere. Our results demonstrate the great potential of the recently upgraded FORS2 spectrograph for optical transmission spectroscopy, obtaining HST-quality light curves from the ground.
A consistent retrieval analysis of 10 Hot Jupiters observed in transmission
Authors:Barstow et alAbstract:We present a consistent optimal estimation retrieval analysis of ten hot Jupiter exoplanets, each with transmission spectral data spanning the visible to near-infrared wavelength range. Using the NEMESIS radiative transfer and retrieval tool, we calculate a range of possible atmospheric states for WASP-6b, WASP-12b, WASP-17b, WASP-19b, WASP-31b, WASP-39b, HD 189733b, HD 209458b, HAT-P-1b and HAT-P-12b. We find that the spectra of all ten planets are consistent with the presence of some atmospheric aerosol; WASP-6b, WASP-12b, WASP-17b, WASP-19b, HD 189733b and HAT-P-12b are all fit best by Rayleigh scattering aerosols, whereas WASP-31b, WASP-39b and HD 209458b are better represented by a grey cloud model. HAT-P-1b has solutions that fall into both categories. WASP-6b, HAT-P-12b, HD 189733b and WASP-12b must have aerosol extending to low atmospheric pressures (below 0.1 mbar). In general, planets with equilibrium temperatures between 1300 and 1700 K are best represented by deeper, grey cloud layers, whereas cooler or hotter planets are better fit using high Rayleigh scattering aerosol. We find little evidence for the presence of molecular absorbers other than H2O. Retrieval methods can provide a consistent picture across a range of hot Jupiter atmospheres with existing data, and will be a powerful tool for the interpretation of James Webb Space Telescope observations.
Wednesday, January 18, 2017
Giant planet formation at the pressure maxima of protoplanetary disks
Giant planet formation at the pressure maxima of protoplanetary disks
Authors:
Guilera et al
Abstract:
Context.
In the classical core-accretion planet formation scenario, rapid inward migration and accretion timescales of kilometer size planetesimals may not favour the formation of massive cores of giant planets before the dissipation of protoplanetary disks. On the other hand, the existence of pressure maxima in the disk could act as migration traps and locations for solid material accumulation, favoring the formation of massive cores.
Aims.
We aim to study the radial drift of planetesimals and planet migration at pressure maxima in a protoplanetary disk and their implications for the formation of massive cores as triggering a gaseous runaway accretion phase.
Methods.
The time evolution of a viscosity driven accretion disk is solved numerically introducing a a dead zone as a low-viscosity region in the protoplanetary disk. A population of planetesimals evolving by radial drift and accretion by the planets is also considered. Finally, the embryos embedded in the disk grow by the simultaneous accretion of planetesimals and the surrounding gas.
Results.
Our simulations show that the pressure maxima generated at the edges of the low-viscosity region of the disk act as planet migration traps, and that the planetesimal surface densities are significantly increased due to the radial drift towards pressure maxima locations. However, our simulations also show that migration trap locations and planetesimal accumulation locations are not exactly at the same positions. Thus, a planet's semi-major axis oscillations around zero torque locations, predicted by MHD and HD simulations, are needed for the planet to accrete all the available material accumulated at the pressure maxima.
Conclusions.
Pressure maxima generated at the edges of a low-viscosity region of a protoplanetary disk seem to be preferential locations for the formation and trap of massive cores.
Do Gas Giant Planets Form at Migration Convergence Zones?
THE FORMATION OF CORES OF GIANT PLANETS AT CONVERGENCE ZONES OF PLANETARY MIGRATION
Authors:
Sirono et al
Abstract:
The formation of solid cores in giant planets of mass $\sim 10\,{M}_{\oplus }$ is numerically simulated following the scenario of Sándor et al. In this scenario, there are two convergence zones, corresponding to the outer and inner edges of the dead zone, where the torque exerted on planetary embryos by the gas nebula is zero. At the outer edge of the dead zone, anticyclonic vortices accumulate infalling dust aggregates, and planetary embryos are continuously formed in this scenario. We performed N-body simulations and show that massive objects of $\simeq 10\,{M}_{\oplus }$ are formed in ~2.5 Myr, starting from the embryos. The largest object is formed at the inner convergence zone, although planetary embryos are placed at the outer convergence zone. This is due to the scattering of embryos from the outer to the inner convergence zone, and the shorter damping timescale of eccentricity at the inner convergence zone compared to the outer one. We varied the migration timescale due to the torque from gas by changing the gas surface density around the convergence zones. We found that there is a critical migration timescale below which $10\,{M}_{\oplus }$-sized objects are formed. Furthermore, we conducted simulations in which the gas surface density evolves according to viscous accretion. The largest object is also formed at the inner convergence zone irrespective of the strength of turbulence. Throughout the simulations, the location of the largest mass is the inner convergence zone. We confirmed that the formation timescale of a core of a Jovian planet can be explained in this scenario.
A desert of gas giant planets beyond tens of au
Authors:Nayakshin et alAbstract:Direct imaging observations constrain the fraction of stars orbited by gas giant planets with separations greater than 10 au to about 0.01 only. This is widely believed to indicate that massive protoplanetary discs rarely fragment on planetary mass objects. I use numerical simulations of gas clumps embedded in massive gas discs to show that these observations are consistent with ∼0.2−10 planetary mass clumps per star being born in young gravitationally unstable discs. A trio of processes -- rapid clump migration, tidal disruption and runaway gas accretion -- destroys or transforms all of the simulated clumps into other objects, resulting in a desert of gas giants beyond separation of approximately 10 au. The cooling rate of the disc controls which of the three processes is dominant. For cooling rates faster than a few local dynamical times, clumps always grow rapidly and become massive brown dwarfs or low mass stars. For longer cooling times, post-collapse (high density) planets migrate inward to ∼10−20 au where they open a gap in the disc and then continue to migrate inward much less rapidly. Pre-collapse (low density) planets are tidally disrupted and may leave massive solid cores behind. Gas giant planets observed inside the desert, such as those in HR 8799, must have followed an unusual evolutionary path, e.g., their host disc being dispersed in a catastrophic fashion.
Tuesday, January 17, 2017
A Population of planetary systems characterized by short-period, Earth-sized planets
Authors:Steffen et alAbstract:We analyze data from the Quarter 1–17 Data Release 24 (Q1–Q17 DR24) planet candidate catalog from NASA’s Kepler mission, specifically comparing systems with single transiting planets to systems with multiple transiting planets, and identify a population of exoplanets with a necessarily distinct system architecture. Such an architecture likely indicates a different branch in their evolutionary past relative to the typical Kepler system. The key feature of these planetary systems is an isolated, Earth-sized planet with a roughly 1-d orbital period. We estimate that at least 24 of the 144 systems we examined (≳ 17%) are members of this population. Accounting for detection efficiency, such planetary systems occur with a frequency similar to the hot Jupiters.
Asymmetric Orbital Distribution near Mean Motion Resonance
Author:XieAbstract:Many multiple-planet systems have been found by the Kepler transit survey and various radial velocity (RV) surveys. Kepler planets show an asymmetric feature, namely, there are small but significant deficits/excesses of planet pairs with orbital period spacing slightly narrow/wide of the exact resonance, particularly near the first order mean motion resonance (MMR), such as 2:1 and 3:2 MMR. Similarly, if not exactly the same, an asymmetric feature (pileup wide of 2:1 MMR) is also seen in RV planets, but only for massive ones. We analytically and numerically study planets' orbital evolutions near and in the MMR. We find that their orbital period ratios could be asymmetrically distributed around the MMR center regardless of dissipation. In the case of no dissipation, Kepler planets' asymmetric orbital distribution could be partly reproduced for 3:2 MMR but not for 2:1 MMR, implying that dissipation might be more important to the latter. The pileup of massive RV planets just wide of 2:1 MMR is found to be consistent with the scenario that planets formed separately then migrated toward the MMR. The location of the pileup infers a K value of 1-100 on the order of magnitude for massive planets, where K is the damping rate ratio between orbital eccentricity and semimajor axis during planet migration.
Dynamically hot Super-Earths from outer giant planet scattering
Authors:Huang et alAbstract:The hundreds of multiple planetary systems discovered by the Kepler mission are typically observed to reside in close-in (≲0.5 AU), low-eccentricity, and low-inclination orbits. We run N-body experiments to study the effect that unstable outer (≳1 AU) giant planets, whose end orbital configurations resemble those in the Radial Velocity population, have on these close-in multiple Super-Earth systems. Our experiments show that the giant planets greatly reduce the multiplicity of the inner Super-Earths and the surviving population can have large eccentricities (e≳0.3) and inclinations (i≳20∘) at levels that anti-correlate with multiplicity. Consequently, this model predicts the existence of a population of dynamically hot single-transiting planets with typical eccentricities and inclinations in the ranges of ∼0.2−0.5 and ∼10∘−40∘. We show that these results can explain the following observations: (i) the recent eccentricity measurements of Kepler super-Earths from transit durations, (ii) the tentative observation that single-transiting systems have a wider distribution of stellar obliquity angles compared to the multiple-transiting systems; (iii) the architecture of some eccentric super-Earths discovered by Radial Velocity surveys such as HD125612c. Future observations from TESS will reveal many more dynamically hot single transiting planets, for which follow up Radial Velocity studies will be able to test our models and see whether they have outer giant planets.
Monday, January 16, 2017
Can Exoplanets Orbiting M Dwarfs be Habitable?
Authors:Shields et alAbstract:The prospects for the habitability of M-dwarf planets have long been debated, due to key differences between the unique stellar and planetary environments around these low-mass stars, as compared to hotter, more luminous Sun-like stars. Over the past decade, significant progress has been made by both space- and ground-based observatories to measure the likelihood of small planets to orbit in the habitable zones of M-dwarf stars. We now know that most M dwarfs are hosts to closely-packed planetary systems characterized by a paucity of Jupiter-mass planets and the presence of multiple rocky planets, with roughly a third of these rocky M-dwarf planets orbiting within the habitable zone, where they have the potential to support liquid water on their surfaces. Theoretical studies have also quantified the effect on climate and habitability of the interaction between the spectral energy distribution of M-dwarf stars and the atmospheres and surfaces of their planets. These and other recent results fill in knowledge gaps that existed at the time of the previous overview papers published nearly a decade ago by Tarter et al. (2007) and Scalo et al. (2007). In this review we provide a comprehensive picture of the current knowledge of M-dwarf planet occurrence and habitability based on work done in this area over the past decade, and summarize future directions planned in this quickly evolving field.
It may be Possible to Detect the Atmosphere of Habitable Zone SuperEarth K2-18b Spectroscopically
Authors:Benneke et alAbstract:The recent detections of two transit events attributed to the super-Earth candidate K2-18b have provided the unprecedented prospect of spectroscopically studying a habitable-zone planet outside the Solar System. Orbiting a nearby M2.5 dwarf and receiving virtually the same stellar insolation as Earth, K2-18b would be a prime candidate for the first detailed atmospheric characterization of a habitable-zone exoplanet using HST and JWST. Here, we report the detection of a third transit of K2-18b near the predicted transit time using the Spitzer Space Telescope. The Spitzer detection demonstrates the periodic nature of the two transit events discovered by K2, confirming that K2-18 is indeed orbited by a super-Earth in a 33-day orbit and ruling out the alternative scenario of two similarly-sized, long-period planets transiting only once within the 75-day K2 observation. We also find, however, that the transit event detected by Spitzer occurred 1.85 hours (7-sigma) before the predicted transit time. Our joint analysis of the Spitzer and K2 photometry reveals that this early occurrence of the transit is not caused by transit timing variations (TTVs), but the result of an inaccurate K2 ephemeris due to a previously undetected data anomaly in the K2 photometry likely caused by a cosmic ray hit. We refit the ephemeris and find that K2-18b would have been lost for future atmospheric characterizations with HST and JWST if we had not secured its ephemeris shortly after the discovery. We caution that immediate follow-up observations as presented here will also be critical in confirming and securing future planets discovered by TESS, in particular if only two transit events are covered by the relatively short 27-day TESS campaigns.
Ground-based Transit Observation of the Habitable-zone super-Earth K2-3d
Authors:Fukui et alAbstract:We report the first ground-based transit observation of K2-3d, a 1.5 R_Earth planet supposedly within the habitable zone around a bright M-dwarf host star, using the Okayama 188-cm telescope and the multi(grz)-band imager MuSCAT. Although the depth of the transit (0.7 mmag) is smaller than the photometric precisions (1.2, 0.9, and 1.2 mmag per 60 s for g, r, and z bands, respectively), we marginally but consistently identify the transit signal in all three bands, by taking advantage of the transit parameters from K2, and by introducing a novel technique that leverages multi-band information to reduce the systematics caused by second-order extinction. We also revisit previously analyzed Spitzer transit observations of K2-3d to investigate the possibility of systematic offsets in transit timing, and find that all the timing data can be explained well by a linear ephemeris. We revise the orbital period of K2-3d to be 44.55612 \pm 0.00021 days, which corrects the predicted transit times in 2019, i.e., the JWST era, by \sim80 minutes. Our observation demonstrates that (1) even ground-based, 2-m class telescopes can play an important role in refining the transit ephemeris of small-sized, long-period planets, and that (2) a multi-band imager is useful to reduce the systematics of atmospheric origin, in particular for bluer bands and for observations conducted at low-altitude observatories.
Sunday, January 15, 2017
The Coupled Physical Structure of Gas and Dust in the IM Lup Protoplanetary Disk
Authors:Cleeves et alAbstract:The spatial distribution of gas and solids in protoplanetary disks determines the composition and formation efficiency of planetary systems. A number of disks show starkly different distributions for the gas and small grains compared to millimeter-centimeter sized dust. We present new Atacama Large Millimeter/Submillimeter Array (ALMA) observations of the dust continuum, CO, 13CO, and C18O in the IM Lup protoplanetary disk, one of the first systems where this dust-gas dichotomy was clearly seen. The 12CO is detected out to a radius of 970 AU, while the millimeter continuum emission is truncated at just 313 AU. Based upon this data, we have built a comprehensive physical and chemical model for the disk structure, which takes into account the complex, coupled nature of the gas and dust and the interplay between the local and external environment. We constrain the distributions of gas and dust, the gas temperatures, the CO abundances, the CO optical depths, and the incident external radiation field. We find that the reduction/removal of dust from the outer disk exposes this region to higher stellar and external radiation and decreases the rate of freeze-out, allowing CO to remain in the gas out to large radial distances. We estimate a gas-phase CO abundance of 5% of the ISM value and a low external radiation field (G0≲4). The latter is consistent with that expected from the local stellar population. We additionally find tentative evidence for ring-like continuum substructure, suggestions of isotope-selective photodissociation, and a diffuse gas halo.
Can dead zones create transition disk like structures?
Authors:Pinilla et alAbstract:Regions of low ionisation where the activity of the magneto-rotational instability is suppressed, the so called dead zones, have been suggested to explain gaps and asymmetries of transition disks. We investigate the gas and dust evolution simultaneously assuming simplified prescriptions for a dead zone and a magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) wind acting on the disk. We explore whether or not the resulting gas and dust distribution can create signatures similar to the ones observed in transition disks. For the dust evolution, we include the transport, growth, and fragmentation of dust particles. To compare with observations, we produce synthetic images in scattered optical light and in thermal emission at mm wavelengths. In all models with a dead zone, a bump in the gas surface density is produced, which is able to efficiently trap large particles (≳1 mm) at the outer edge of the dead zone. The gas bump reaches an amplitude of a factor of ∼5, which can be enhanced by the presence of a MHD wind that removes mass from the inner disk. While our 1D simulations suggest that such a structure can be present only for ∼1 Myr, the structure may be maintained for a longer time when a more realistic 2D/3D simulations are performed. In the synthetic images, gap-like low emission regions are seen at scattered light and in thermal emission at mm wavelengths, as previously predicted in the case of planet-disk interaction. As a conclusion, main signatures of transition disks can be reproduced by assuming a dead zone in the disk, including gap-like structure in scattered light and millimetre continuum emission, and a lower gas surface density within the dead zone. Previous studies showed that the Rossby wave instability can also develop at the edge of such dead zones, forming vortices and creating also asymmetries.
Spirals in protoplanetary disks from photon travel time
Authors:Kama et alAbstract:Spiral structures are a common feature in scattered-light images of protoplanetary disks, and of great interest as possible tracers of the presence of planets. However, other mechanisms have been put forward to explain them, including self-gravity, disk-envelope interactions, and dead zone boundaries. These mechanisms explain many spirals very well, but are unable to easily account for very loosely wound spirals and single spiral arms. We study the effect of light travel time on the shape of a shadow cast by a clump orbiting close (within ~ 1 au) of the central star, where there can be significant orbital motion during the light travel time from the clump to the outer disk and then to the sky plane. This delay in light rays reaching the sky plane gives rise to a variety of spiral- and arc-shaped shadows, which we describe with a general fitting formula for a flared, inclined disk.
Saturday, January 14, 2017
Behaviour of elements from lithium to europium in stars with and without planets
Authors:Mishenina et alAbstract:We conducted an analysis of the distribution of elements from lithium to europium in 200 dwarfs in the solar neighbourhood ~20 pc with temperatures in the range 4800-6200 K and metallicities [Fe/H] higher than -0.5 dex. Determinations of atmospheric parameters and the chemical composition of the dwarfs were taken from our previous studies. We found that the lithium abundances in the planet-hosting solar-analog stars of our sample were lower than those in the stars without planetary systems. Our results reveal no significant differences exceeding the determination errors for the abundances of investigated elements, except for aluminium and barium, which are more and less abundant in the planet-hosting stars, respectively. We did not find confident dependences of the lithium, aluminium and barium abundances on the ages of our target stars (which is probable because of the small number of stars). Furthermore, we found no correlation between the abundance differences in [El/Fe] and the condensation temperature (Tcond) for stars in the 16 Cyg binary system, unlike the case for 51 Peg (HD 217014), for which a slight excess of volatile elements and a deficit of refractories were obtained relative to those of solar twins. We found that one of the components of 16 Cyg exhibits a slightly higher average abundance than its counterpart (<[El/H](A-B)> = 0.08+/-0.02 dex); however, no significant abundance trend versus Tcond was observed. Owing to the relatively large errors, we cannot provide further constraints for this system.
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