Related papers: Characterizing small planets transiting small star…
The most successful method used so far to search for extrasolar planets is the radial velocity technique, where periodical shifts on the measured emission from a star provide evidence for an orbiting planet. This method has been used on…
We carry out an independent search of Kepler photometry for small transiting planets with sizes 0.5--8.0 times that of Earth and orbital periods between 5 and 50 days, with the goal of measuring the fraction of stars harboring such planets.…
By targeting nearby M dwarfs, a transit search using modest equipment is capable of discovering planets as small as 2 Earth radii in the habitable zones of their host stars. The MEarth Project, a future transit search, aims to employ a…
The SPace Infrared telescope for Cosmology and Astrophysics (SPICA) is a proposed mid-to-far infrared (4-200 um) astronomy mission, scheduled for launch in 2017. A single, 3.5m aperture telescope would provide superior image quality at…
Context. The prototypical low-mass young stellar object, T Tauri, is a well-studied multiple system with at least three components. Aims. We aim to explore the T Tau system with the highest spatial resolution, study the time evolution of…
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…
We present precision 4.5 $\mu$m Spitzer transit photometry of eight planet candidates discovered by the K2 mission: K2-52 b, K2-53 b, EPIC 205084841.01, K2-289 b, K2-174 b, K2-87 b, K2-90 b, and K2-124 b. The sample includes four…
In search for a connection between the formation of stars and the formation of planets, a new semi-automatic spectral analysis method using \textsf{iSpec} was developed for the TIGRE telescope installed in Guanajuato, Mexico. TIGRE is a…
Nearly everything we know about extrasolar planets to date comes from optical astronomy. While exoplanetary aurorae are predicted to be bright at low radio frequencies (< 1 GHz), we consider the effect of an exoplanet transit on radio…
The WFIRST microlensing mission will measure precise light curves and relative parallaxes for millions of stars, giving it the potential to characterize short-period transiting planets all along the line of sight and into the galactic…
The Low Resolution Spectrometer of the MIRI, which forms part of the imager module, will provide R~100 long-slit and slitless spectroscopy from 5 to 12 micron. The design is optimised for observations of compact sources, such as exoplanet…
Submillimeter and near-infrared images of cool dusty debris disks and rings suggest the existence of unseen planets. At dusty but non-imaged stars, semi-major axes of associated planets can be estimated from the dust temperature. For some…
Small planets are extremely common in the Galaxy, including planets with masses and radii between those of Earth and Neptune. Characterizing these planets' masses requires ultra-precise radial velocities. The ESPRESSO spectrograph was…
The SHINE project is a 500-star survey performed with SPHERE on the VLT for the purpose of directly detecting new substellar companions and understanding their formation and early evolution. Here we present an initial statistical analysis…
Measurements of the frequency with which short-period planets occur around main sequence stars allows a direct prediction of the number and types of such planets that will be amenable to characterization by high-contrast instruments on…
Small, cool planets represent the typical end-products of planetary formation. Studying the archi- tectures of these systems, measuring planet masses and radii, and observing these planets' atmospheres during transit directly informs…
The Planet Hunting and Asteroseismology Explorer Spectrophotometer, PHASES, is a concept for a space-borne instrument to obtain flux calibrated spectra and measure micro-magnitude photometric variations of nearby stars. The science drivers…
We plan to take advantage of the unprecedented combination of low thermal background and high resolution provided by the 6.5m MMT's adaptive secondary mirror, to target the 3-5 micron atmospheric window where giant planets are expected to…
Transit spectroscopy is the most promising path toward characterizing nearby terrestrial planets at mid-infrared wavelengths in the next 20 years. The Spitzer Space telescope has achieved moderately good mid-infrared photometric precision…
The Suborbital Imaging Spectrograph for Transition region Irradiance from Nearby Exoplanet host stars (SISTINE) is a rocket-borne ultraviolet (UV) imaging spectrograph designed to probe the radiation environment of nearby stars. SISTINE…