Related papers: A Quantitative Criterion for Defining Planets

Transit observations have found the majority of exoplanets to date. Spectroscopic observations of transits and eclipses are the most commonly used tool to characterize exoplanet atmospheres and will be used in the search for life. However,…

Many exoplanets are discovered in binary star systems in internal or in circumbinary orbits. Whether the planet can be habitable or not depends on the possibility to maintain liquid water on its surface, and therefore on the luminosity of…

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…

This paper explores the stability of an Earth-like planet orbiting a solar mass star in the presence of an outer-lying intermediate mass companion. The overall goal is to estimate the fraction of binary systems that allow Earth-like planets…

Recently, Odrzywolek and Rafelski (arXiv:1612.03556) have found three distinct categories of exoplanets, when they are classified based on density. We first carry out a similar classification of exoplanets according to their density using…

Orbital parameters of planets are fitted directly to an appropriate set of observations. It is shown how to use the rigorous Deming method combined with a numerical integration of gravitation equations. In all, 65 parameters of the nine…

Determination of an exoplanet's mass is a key to understanding its basic properties, including its potential for supporting life. To date, mass constraints for exoplanets are predominantly based on radial velocity (RV) measurements, which…

Gravitational microlensing is one of the methods to detect exoplanets; planets outside our solar system. Here we focus on theoretical modeling of three lens systems and in particular circumbinary systems. Circumbinary systems include two…

The radial velocities of ~1800 nearby Sun-like stars are currently being monitored by eight high-sensitivity Doppler exoplanet surveys. Approximately 90 of these stars have been found to host exoplanets massive enough to be detectable. Thus…

Recent analysis of the Doppler shift oscillations of the light from extra-solar planetary systems indicate that some of these systems have more than one large planet. In this case it has been shown that the masses of these planets can be…

Terrestrial exoplanets are on the verge of joining the ranks of astronomically accessible objects. Interpreting their observable characteristics, and informing decisions on instrument design and use, will hinge on the ability to model these…

Studies of transiting extra-solar planets are of key importance for understanding the nature of planets outside our Solar System, because their densities can be determined, constraining of what the planets are made of. Using the data…

The field of exoplanets is quickly expanding from just the detection of new planets and the measurement of their most basic parameters, such as mass, radius and orbital configuration, to the first measurements of their atmospheric…

Two decades ago, astronomers began detecting planets orbiting stars other than our Sun, so-called exoplanets. Since that time, the rate of detections and the sensitivity to ever-smaller planets has improved dramatically with several…

We investigate potential biases in the measurements of exoplanet orbital parameters obtained from radial velocity observations for single-planet systems. We create a mock catalog of radial velocity data, choosing input planet masses,…

There are many competing theories and models describing the formation, migration and evolution of exoplanet systems. As both the precision with which we can characterize exoplanets and their host stars, and the number of systems for which…

Wide-orbit exoplanets are starting to be detected, and planetary formation models are under development to understand their properties. We propose a population of "Oort" planets around other stars, forming by a mechanism analogous to how…

In December 2012, Austria will launch its first two satellites: UniBRITE and BRITE-Austria. This is the first pair of three, forming a network called BRITE-Constellation. The other pairs being contributed by Canada and Poland. The primary…

Uncovering the formation process that reproduces the distinct properties of compact super-Earth exoplanet systems is a major goal of planet formation theory. The most successful model argues that non-resonant systems begin as resonant…

The determination of an exoplanet as rocky is critical for the assessment of planetary habitability. Observationally, the number of small-radius, transiting planets with accompanying mass measurements is insufficient for a robust…