Related papers: Using Kepler transit observations to measure stell…
It is shown herein that planets with eccentric orbits are more likely to transit than circularly orbiting planets with the same semimajor axis by a factor of (1-e^2)^{-1}. If the orbital parameters of discovered transiting planets are…
We present a method for finding binaries among pulsating stars that were observed by the Kepler Mission. We use entire four-year light curves to accurately measure the frequencies of the strongest pulsation modes, then track the pulsation…
When an extrasolar planet passes in front of its star (transits), its radius can be measured from the decrease in starlight and its orbital period from the time between transits. Multiple planets transiting the same star reveal more: period…
By surveying new fields for the shortest-period "big" planets, the Kepler spacecraft could provide the statistics to more clearly measure the occurrence distributions of giant and medium planets. This would allow separate determinations for…
We analyze variations in the transit lightcurves of CoRoT-2b, a massive hot Jupiter orbiting a highly active G star. We use one transit lightcurve to eclipse-map a photospheric spot occulted by the planet. In this case study we determine…
We present results regarding the longitudinal migrations of cool stellar spots that exhibit remarkable oscillations and explore their possible causes. We conducted analyses using high-quality data from nine target systems of various…
Some transiting planets discovered by the Kepler mission display transit timing variations (TTVs) induced by stellar spots that rotate on the visible hemisphere of their parent stars. An induced TTV can be observed when a planet crosses a…
The current photometric datasets, that span decades, allow for studying long-term cycles on active stars. Complementary Ca H&K observations give information also on the cycles of normal solar-like stars, which have significantly smaller,…
Currently, over forty transiting planets have been discovered by ground-based photometric surveys, and space-based missions like Kepler and CoRoT are expected to detect hundreds more. Follow-up photometric observations from the ground will…
Context. Detecting regular dips in the light curve of a star is an easy way to detect the presence of an orbiting planet. COROT is a Franco-European mission launched at the end of 2006, and one of its main objectives is to detect planetary…
We systematically study pulsar light curves, taking into account the special relativistic effect, i.e., the Doppler factor due to the fast spin of the neutron stars, together with the time delay, which comes from the difference of the…
The Kepler Mission has discovered thousands of exoplanets and revolutionized our understanding of their population. This large, homogeneous catalog of discoveries has enabled rigorous studies of the occurrence rate of exoplanets and…
Of the approximately 350 extrasolar planets currently known, of order 10% orbit evolved stars with radii R >~ 2.5 R_sun. These planets are of particular interest because they tend to orbit more massive hosts, and have been subjected to…
Stellar magnetic fields are poorly understood but are known to be important for stellar evolution and exoplanet habitability. They drive stellar activity, which is the main observational constraint on theoretical models for magnetic field…
We describe statistical methods for measuring the exoplanet multiplicity function - the fraction of host stars containing a given number of planets - from transit and radial-velocity surveys. The analysis is based on the approximation of…
We present rotation periods for thousands of active stars in the Kepler field derived from Q3 data. In most cases a second period close to the rotation period was detected, which we interpreted as surface differential rotation (DR). Active…
The Rossiter-McLaughlin (RM) effect is the distortion of stellar spectral lines that occurs during eclipses or transits, due to stellar rotation. We assess the future prospects for using the RM effect to measure the alignment of planetary…
Existing upper limits on variations in the photospheric radius of the Sun during the solar magnetic activity cycle are at a fractional amplitude of 2x10^{-4}. At that level, the transit duration of a close-in planet around a Sun-like star…
The Planetary Transits and Oscillations of stars mission (PLATO) will allow us to measure surface rotation and monitor photometric activity of tens of thousands of main sequence solar-type and subgiant stars. This paper is the first of a…
In this PhD dissertation, I discuss issues of the Radial Velocities (RV) and transit methods. These techniques allow us to derive the mass and radius of an exoplanet, necessary to model its bulk structure and to have insight on its…