Related papers: Refining Exoplanet Ephemerides and Transit Observi…
The radius of a planet is a fundamental parameter that probes its composition and habitability. Precise radius measurements are typically derived from the fraction of starlight blocked when a planet transits its host star. The wide-field…
The radial velocity technique is currently used to classify transiting objects. While capable of identifying grazing binary eclipses, this technique cannot reliably identify blends, a chance overlap of a faint background eclipsing binary…
Theoretical studies predict that Trojans are likely a frequent byproduct of planet formation and evolution. We examine the sensitivity of transit timing observations for detecting Trojan companions to transiting extrasolar planets. We…
The timing method, using either stellar pulsations or eclipse timing of close binaries as a clock, is proving to be an efficient way to detect planets around stars that have evolved beyond the red giant branch. In this article we present a…
Radial velocity (RV) surveys have detected hundreds of exoplanets through their gravitational interactions with their host stars. Some will be transiting, but most lack sufficient follow-up observations to confidently detect (or rule out)…
The transit method of exoplanet discovery and characterization has enabled numerous breakthroughs in exoplanetary science. These include measurements of planetary radii, mass-radius relationships, stellar obliquities, bulk density…
Since the discovery of the first exoplanets more than 20 years ago, there has been an increasing need for photometric and spectroscopic models to characterize these systems. While imaging has been used extensively for Solar System bodies…
The presence of silicate material in known rings in the Solar System raises the possibility of ring systems existing even within the snow line -- where most transiting exoplanets are found. Previous studies have shown that the detection of…
In the last decade, over a million stars were monitored to detect transiting planets. Manual interpretation of potential exoplanet candidates is labor intensive and subject to human error, the results of which are difficult to quantify.…
The detection of exoplanets through direct imaging has produced numerous new positive identifications in recent years. The technique is biased towards planets at wide separations due to the difficulty in removing the stellar signature at…
Mountain ranges, volcanoes, trenches, and craters are common on rocky bodies throughout the Solar System, and we might we expect the same for rocky exoplanets. With ever larger telescopes under design and a growing need to not just detect…
For much of human history we have wondered how our solar system formed, and whether there are any other planets like ours around other stars. Only in the last 20 years have we had direct evidence for the existence of exoplanets, with the…
NASA's Kepler Space Telescope has successfully discovered thousands of exoplanet candidates using the transit method, including hundreds of stars with multiple transiting planets. In order to estimate the frequency of these valuable…
Transiting planets manifest themselves by a periodic dimming of their host star by a fixed amount. On the other hand, light curves of transiting circumbinary (CB) planets are expected to be neither periodic nor to have a single depth while…
Exploring exoplanets has transformed our understanding of the universe by revealing many planetary systems that defy our current understanding. To study their atmospheres, spectroscopic observations are used to infer essential atmospheric…
Over two decades of exoplanetology have yielded thousands of discoveries, yet some types of systems are yet to be observed. Circumstellar planets around one star in a binary have been found, but not for tight binaries (< 5 AU).…
The best-characterized exoplanets to date are planets on close-in transiting orbits around their host stars. The high level of irradiation and transiting geometry of these objects make them ideal targets for atmospheric investigations.…
We propose a novel approach to utilize low-cadence photometric surveys for exoplanetary transit search. Even if transits are undetectable in the survey database alone, it can still be useful for finding preferred times for directed…
A promising method for detecting earth-sized exoplanets is the timing analysis of a known transit. The technique allows a search for variations in either the transit duration or the center induced by the perturbation of a third body, e.g. a…
The orbital parameters of extra-solar planets have a significant impact on the probability that the planet will transit the host star. This was recently demonstrated by the transit detection of HD 17156b whose favourable eccentricity and…