Related papers: Venus transit, aureole and solar diameter
The solar diameter changes or not? Whatever will be the answer the methods used for its measurements are more and more challenging, and facing new astrophysical and optical problems since the required space resolution is of astrometric…
In recent years, a number of observations have been made of the transits of 'Hot Jupiters', such as HD 189733b, which have been modelled to derive atmospheric structure and composition. As measurement techniques improve, the transit spectra…
We investigate whether rings around extrasolar planets could be detected from those planets' transit lightcurves. To this end we develop a basic theoretical framework for calculating and interpreting the lightcurves of ringed planet…
The field of exoplanetary science has seen a dramatic improvement in sensitivity to terrestrial planets over recent years. Such discoveries have been a key feature of results from the {\it Kepler} mission which utilizes the transit method…
The Sun is not quite a perfect sphere, and its oblateness, thought to be induced through its rotation, has been measured using optical observations of its radius. Its gravitational quadrupole moment can then be deduced using solar models,…
We review the importance of recent UV observations of solar system targets and discuss the need for further measurements, instrumentation and laboratory work in the coming decade. In the past decade, numerous important advances have been…
Giant impacts were common in the early evolution of the Solar System, and it is possible that Venus also experienced an impact. A giant impact on Venus could have affected its rotation rate and possibly its thermal evolution. In this work,…
The Kepler Mission, launched on Mar 6, 2009 was designed with the explicit capability to detect Earth-size planets in the habitable zone of solar-like stars using the transit photometry method. Results from just forty-three days of data…
The non-spherical shape of the Sun has been invoked to explain the anomalous precession of Mercury. A brief history of some methods for measuring solar diameter is presented. Archimedes was the first to give upper and lower values for solar…
Here we explore the possibility of extending to the Solar System scenario the combined residual approach employed for the deterination of the Lense-Thirring effect in the Earth-LAGEOS satellites system. After calculating the secular…
E.V. Pitjeva, by processing more than 400,000 planetary observations of various types with the dynamical models of the EPM2006 ephemerides, recently estimated a correction to the canonical Newtonian-Einsteinian Venus' perihelion precession…
We analyze data from multiple flybys by the Solar Orbiter, BepiColombo, and Parker Solar Probe (PSP) missions to study the interaction between Venus' plasma environment and the solar wind forming the induced magnetosphere. Through…
A surprisingly large amount of information on our solar system can be gained from simple measurements of the apparent angular diameters of the sun and the moon. This information includes the average density of the sun, the distance between…
As we become aware of Earth's changing climate, and as we discover terrestrial planets in other solar systems, we gain ever more reasons to study the Earth's nearest neighbour and closest sibling, the only Earth-sized planet besides our own…
Terrestrial exoplanets orbiting within or near their host stars' habitable zone are potentially apt for life. It has been proposed that time-series measurements of reflected starlight from such planets will reveal their rotational period,…
Why are the terrestrial planets so different? Venus should be the most Earth-like of all our planetary neighbours. Its size, bulk composition and distance from the Sun are very similar to those of the Earth. Its original atmosphere was…
High spectral resolution observations of Venus were obtained with the TEXES instrument at NASA's Infrared Telescope Facility. These observations focus on a CO$_2$ absorption feature at 791.4 cm$^{-1}$ as the shape of this absorption feature…
One of the most intriguing, long-standing questions regarding Venus' atmosphere is the origin and distribution of the unknown UV-absorber, responsible for the absorption band detected at the near-UV and blue range of Venus' spectrum. In…
We describe the prediction, design, execution and calibration of stellar and solar occultation observations of Saturn's rings by the Visual and Infrared Mapping Spectrometer (VIMS) instrument on the Cassini spacecraft. Particular attention…
Observations of the November 1995 Sun crossing of the Saturn's ring-plane made with the 3.6m CFH telescope, using the UHAO adaptive optics system, are presented here. We report the detection of four arcs located in the vicinity of the F…