Related papers: Inverting Phase Functions to Map Exoplanets
Secondary eclipses and phase curves reveal information about the reflectivity and heat distribution in exoplanet atmospheres. The phase curve is composed of a combination of reflected, and thermally emitted light from the planet, and for…
The transit method allows the detection and characterization of planetary systems by analyzing stellar light curves. Convolutional neural networks appear to offer a viable solution for automating these analyses. In this research, two 1D…
Never before has the detection and characterization of exoplanets via transit photometry been as promising and feasible as it is now, due to the increasing breadth and sensitivity of time domain optical surveys. Past works have made use of…
Abstract abridged. Eclipsing binary systems provide the opportunity to measure the fundamental parameters of their component stars in a stellar-model-independent way. This makes them ideal candidates for testing and calibrating theories of…
As a test-bed for future investigations of directly imaged terrestrial exoplanets, we present the recovery of the surface components of the Earth from multi-band diurnal light curves obtained with the EPOXI spacecraft. We find that the…
Direct imaging of exoplanets is a challenging task as it requires to reach a high contrast at very close separation to the star. Today, the main limitation in the high-contrast images is the quasi-static speckles that are created by…
We propose that astronomers will be eventually be able to discriminate between extrasolar Earth-like planets with surface oceans and those without using the shape of phase light curves in the visible and near-IR spectrum. We model the…
Time-series photometry and spectroscopy of transiting exoplanets allow us to study their atmospheres. Unfortunately, the required precision to extract atmospheric information surpasses the design specifications of most general purpose…
Finding potential life harboring exo-Earths is one of the aims of exoplanetary science. Detecting signatures of life in exoplanets will likely first be accomplished by determining the bulk composition of the planetary atmosphere via…
Coronagraph designs which use photonic integrated circuits have the highest theoretical throughput for off-axis signals, and therefore the highest potential exoplanet yield for future high-contrast direct imaging campaigns. Using the…
Very precise measurements of exoplanet transit lightcurves both from ground and space based observatories make it now possible to fit the limb-darkening coefficients in the transit-fitting procedure rather than fix them to theoretical…
It is expected that the next generation of high-contrast imaging instruments will deliver the first unresolved image of an extrasolar planet. The emitted thermal infrared light from the planet should show no phase effect assuming the planet…
Spectral retrieval techniques are currently our best tool to interpret the observed exoplanet atmospheric data. Said techniques retrieve the optimal atmospheric components and parameters by identifying the best fit to an observed…
We present a method that employs the secondary eclipse light curves of transiting extrasolar planets to probe the spatial variation of their thermal emission. This technique permits an observer to resolve the surface of the planet without…
We derive the first secondary eclipse map of an exoplanet, HD 189733b, based on Spitzer IRAC 8 micron data. We develop two complementary techniques for deriving the two dimensional planet intensity: regularized slice mapping and spherical…
The prevailing assumption is that all exoplanets are made of ordinary matter. However, we propose an unconventional possibility that some exoplanets could be made of dark matter, which we name "dark exoplanets." In this paper, we explore…
We explore how finite integration time or temporal binning can affect the analysis of exoplanet phase-curves. We provide analytical formulae to account for this effect or, if neglected, to estimate the potential biases in the retrieved…
Exoplanet transmission spectra, which measure the absorption of light passing through a planet's atmosphere during transit, are most often assessed globally, resulting in a single spectrum per planetary atmosphere. However, the inherent…
Today, there exists a wide variety of algorithms dedicated to high-contrast imaging, especially for the detection and characterisation of exoplanet signals. These algorithms are tailored to address the very high contrast between the…
Ambitious studies of Earth-like extrasolar planets are outlined in the context of an exploration initiative for a return to the Earth's Moon. Two mechanism for linearly polarizing light reflected from Earth-like planets are discussed: 1)…