Related papers: Photometric characterization of exoplanets using a…
Previous generation of instruments have the opportunity to discover thousands of extra-solar planets and more will come with the current and future planet-search missions. In order to go one step further in the characterization of…
Detecting and confirming terrestrial planets is incredibly difficult due to their tiny size and mass relative to Sun-like host stars. However, recent instrumental advancements are making the detection of Earth-like exoplanets…
Since the first discovery of an extra-solar planet around a main-sequence star, in 1995, the number of detected exoplanets has increased enormously. Over the past two decades, observational instruments (both onboard and on ground-based…
At optical wavelengths, an exoplanet's signature is essentially reflected light from the host star - several orders of magnitude fainter. Since it is superimposed on the star spectrum its detection has been a difficult observational…
Searching for extrasolar planets by direct detection is extremely challenging for current instrumentation. Indirect methods, that measure the effect of a planet on its host star, are much more promising and have indeed led to the discovery…
The high contrast and spatial resolution requirements for directly imaging exoplanets requires effective coordination of wavefront control, coronagraphy, observation techniques, and post-processing algorithms. However, even with this suite…
High-contrast imaging has been used to discover and characterize dozens of exoplanets to date. The primary limiting performance factor for these instruments is contrast, the ratio of exoplanet to host star brightness that an instrument can…
RefPlanets is a guaranteed time observation (GTO) programme that uses the Zurich IMaging POLarimeter (ZIMPOL) of SPHERE/VLT for a blind search for exoplanets in wavelengths from 600-900 nm. The goals of this study are the characterization…
The detection of exoplanets in high-contrast imaging (HCI) data hinges on post-processing methods to remove spurious light from the host star. So far, existing methods for this task hardly utilize any of the available domain knowledge about…
Direct imaging of exoplanets is particularly challenging due to the high contrast between the planet and the star luminosities, and their small angular separation. In addition to tailored instrumental facilities implementing adaptive optics…
Imaging of planets is very difficult, due to the glare from their nearby, much brighter suns. Static and slowly-evolving aberrations are the limiting factors, even after application of adaptive optics. The residual speckle pattern is highly…
Context: With no conclusive detection to date, the search for exomoons, satellites of planets orbiting other stars, remains a formidable challenge. Detecting these objects, compiling a population-level sample and constraining their…
EXONEST is an algorithm dedicated to detecting and characterizing the photometric signatures of exoplanets, which include reflection and thermal emission, Doppler boosting, and ellipsoidal variations. Using Bayesian Inference, we can test…
Context. High-contrast exoplanet imaging is a rapidly growing field as can be seen through the significant resources invested. In fact, the detection and characterization of exoplanets through direct imaging is featured at all major…
We use Monte Carlo simulations to estimate the number of extrasolar planets that are directly detectable in the solar-neighborhood using current and forthcoming high-contrast imaging instruments. Our calculations take into account the…
Observations of extrasolar planets using Integral Field Spectroscopy (IFS), if coupled with an extreme Adaptive Optics system and analyzed with a Simultaneous Differential Imaging technique (SDI), are a powerful tool to detect and…
Thanks to the advances in modern instrumentation we have learned about many exoplanets that span a wide range of masses and composition. Studying their atmospheres provides insight into planetary origin, evolution, dynamics, and…
Today's most detailed characterization of exoplanet atmospheres is accessible via transit spectroscopy (TS). Detecting transiting exoplanets only yields their size, and it is thus standard to measure a planet's mass before moving towards…
A starshade suppresses starlight by a factor of 1E11 in the image plane of a telescope, which is crucial for directly imaging Earth-like exoplanets. The state of the art in high contrast post-processing and signal detection methods were…
We research the requirements of High Contrast Imaging when combined with the cross correlation (CC) of high resolution spectra with known spectroscopic templates for detecting and characterising exoplanets in reflected light. We simulate…