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Planets emit thermal radiation and reflect incident light that they recieve from their host stars. As a planet orbits it's host star the photometric variations associated with these two effects produce very similar phase curves. If observed…
We present results from an atmospheric circulation study of nine hot Jupiters that comprise a large transmission spectral survey using the Hubble and Spitzer Space Telescopes. These observations exhibit a range of spectral behavior over…
Using a 3D GCM, we create dynamical model atmospheres of a representative transiting giant exoplanet, HD 209458b. We post-process these atmospheres with an opacity code to obtain transit radius spectra during the primary transit. Using a…
Turbulence is ubiquitous in Solar System planetary atmospheres. In hot Jupiter atmospheres, the combination of moderately slow rotation and thick pressure scale height may result in dynamical weather structures with unusually large,…
In order to understand the climate on terrestrial planets orbiting nearby Sun-like stars, one would like to know their thermal inertia. We use a global climate model to simulate the thermal phase variations of Earth-analogs and test whether…
Motivated by the work of Guillot (2010), we present a semi-analytical formalism for calculating the temperature-pressure profiles in hot Jovian atmospheres which includes the effects of clouds/hazes and collision-induced absorption. Using…
We present a computationally efficient 1-D seasonal radiative model, with convective adjustment, of Jupiter's atmosphere. Our model takes into account radiative forcings from the main hydrocarbons (methane, ethane, acetylene), ammonia,…
We present a sequence of toy models for irradiated planet atmospheres, in which the effects of geometry and energy redistribution are modelled self-consistently. We use separate but coupled grey atmosphere models to treat the ingoing…
With the development of ever-improving telescopes capable of observing exoplanet atmospheres in greater detail and number, there is a growing demand for enhanced 3D climate models to support and help interpret observational data from space…
In contrast to the Earth, where frictional heating is typically negligible, we show that drag mechanisms could act as an important heat source in the strongly-forced atmospheres of some exoplanets, with the potential to alter the…
From analytical studies of tidal heating, eclipses and planetary illumination, it is clear that the exomoon habitable zone (EHZ) - the set of moon and host planet orbits that permit liquid water on an Earthlike moon's surface - is a…
Highly-irradiated gas giant exoplanets are predicted to show circulation patterns dominated by day-to-night heat transport and a spatial distribution of clouds that is driven by advection and local heating. Hot-Jupiters have been…
The primary scientific objective of this Habitable Worlds Observatory (HWO) Science Case Development Document (SCDD) is to measure planetary rotation rates of transiting exoplanets to determine the structure, composition, circulation, and…
Atmospheric collapse is likely to be of fundamental importance to tidally locked rocky exoplanets but remains understudied. Here, general results on the heat transport and stability of tidally locked terrestrial-type atmospheres are…
The disk-integrated reflected brightness of an exoplanet changes as a function of time due to orbital and rotational motion coupled with an inhomogeneous albedo map. We have previously derived analytic reflected lightcurves for spherical…
Planets reflect and linearly polarize the radiation that they receive from their host stars. The emergent polarization is sensitive to aspects of the planet atmosphere such as the gas composition and the occurrence of condensates and their…
Planets with non-zero obliquity and/or orbital eccentricity experience seasonal variations of stellar irradiation at local latitudes. The extent of the atmospheric response can be crudely estimated by the ratio between the orbital timescale…
A self-consistent, aeronomic model of the upper atmosphere of a "hot Jupiter" including reactions involving suprathermal photoelectrons is presented. This model is used to compute the height profiles of the gas density, velocity, and…
We demonstrate the effectiveness of the Exoplanet Characterisation Observatory mission concept for constraining the atmospheric properties of hot and warm gas giants and super Earths. Synthetic primary and secondary transit spectra for a…
One of the frontier research fields of exoplanetary science is the study of the composition and variability of exoplanetary atmospheres. This field is now moving from the gas giant planets towards the smaller and colder telluric planets,…