Related papers: Simultaneous Exoplanet Characterization and deep w…
The two main advantages of exoplanet imaging are the discovery of objects in the outer part of stellar systems -- constraining models of planet formation --, and its ability to spectrally characterize the planets -- information on their…
Stellar activity causes difficulties in the characterization of transiting exoplanets. Studies have been performed to quantify its impact on infrared interferometry, but not in the visible domain, which however allows reaching better…
Over the past three decades, exoplanet research has delivered an extensive census of planets spanning a wide range of masses, sizes, and orbital configurations. Despite this progress, the physical interpretation of these populations remains…
Direct imaging of extra-solar planets is now a reality, especially with the deployment and commissioning of the first generation of specialized ground-based instruments such as the Gemini Planet Imager and SPHERE. These systems will allow…
Pupil mapping is a promising and unconventional new method for high contrast imaging being considered for terrestrial exoplanet searches. It employs two (or more) specially designed aspheric mirrors to create a high-contrast amplitude…
Direct imaging of exoplanetary systems is a powerful technique that can reveal Jupiter-like planets in wide orbits, can enable detailed characterization of planetary atmospheres, and is a key step towards imaging Earth-like planets. Imaging…
The search for Earth-like exoplanets requires high-contrast and high-angular resolution instruments, which designs can be very complex: they need an adaptive optics system to compensate for the effect of the atmospheric turbulence on image…
Clouds and other features in exoplanet and brown dwarf atmospheres cause variations in brightness as they rotate in and out of view. Ground-based instruments reach the high contrasts and small inner working angles needed to monitor these…
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…
Provided that sufficient resources are deployed, we can look forward to an extraordinary future in which we will characterize potentially habitable planets. Until now, we have had to base interpretations of observations on habitability…
Due to turbulence in the atmosphere images taken from ground-based telescopes become distorted. With adaptive optics (AO) images can be given greater clarity allowing for better observations with existing telescopes and are essential for…
Direct imaging of exoplanets requires very high contrast levels, which are obtained using coronagraphs. But residual quasi-static aberrations create speckles in the focal plane downstream of the coronagraph which mask the planet. This…
So far, most of the about 5700 exoplanets have been discovered mainly with radial velocity and transit methods. These techniques are sensitive to planets in close orbits, not being able to probe large star--planet separations. $\mu$-lensing…
The EXtreme PREcision Spectrograph (EXPRES) is a new Doppler spectrograph designed to reach a radial velocity measurement precision sufficient to detect Earth-like exoplanets orbiting nearby, bright stars. We report on extensive laboratory…
Current technology is not able to map the topography of rocky exoplanets, simply because the objects are too faint and far away to resolve them. Nevertheless, indirect effect of topography should be soon observable thanks to photometry…
With the advent of optical interferometers that will be coming online in the next decade, radial velocity searches for extra-solar planets will be complemented by high angular resolution astrometric measurements. In this paper, we explore…
The presence of a body in an orbit around a close eclipsing binary star manifests itself through the light time effect influencing the observed times of eclipses as the close binary and the circumbinary companion both move around the common…
Asteroseismology is among the most powerful observational tools to determine fundamental properties of stars. Space-based photometry has recently enabled the systematic detection of oscillations in exoplanet host stars, allowing a…
This paper is devoted to study the circumstances favourable to detect circumstellar and circumbinary planets in well detached binary-star-systems using eclipse timing variations (ETVs). We investigated the dynamics of well detached binary…
Several recent designs for planet-finding telescopes use coronagraphs operating at visible wavelengths to suppress starlight along the telescope's optical axis while transmitting any off-axis light from circumstellar material. We describe a…