Related papers: Mapping the Surface of Partially Cloudy Exoplanets…
As a test-bed for future investigations of directly imaged terrestrial exoplanets, we present the recovery of the surface components of the Earth from multi-band diurnal light curves obtained with the EPOXI spacecraft. We find that the…
We develop an inversion technique of annual scattered light curves to sketch a two-dimensional albedo map of exoplanets in face-on orbits. As a test-bed for future observations of extrasolar terrestrial planets, we apply this mapping…
[Abridged] To simulate the kinds of observations that will eventually be obtained for exoplanets, the Deep Impact spacecraft obtained light curves of Earth at seven wavebands spanning 300-1000 nm as part of the EPOXI mission of opportunity.…
With the increasing number of directly imaged giant exoplanets the current atmosphere models are often not capable of fully explaining the spectra and luminosity of the sources. A particularly challenging component of the atmosphere models…
Planned missions will spatially resolve temperate terrestrial planets from their host star. Although reflected light from such a planet encodes information about its surface, it has not been shown how to establish surface characteristics of…
The varied surfaces and atmospheres of planets make them interesting places to live, explore, and study from afar. Unfortunately, the great distance to exoplanets makes it impossible to resolve their disk with current or near-term…
Direct-imaging spectra hold rich information about a planet's atmosphere and surface, and several space-based missions aiming at such observations will become a reality in the near future. Previous spectral retrieval works have resulted in…
Scattered lights from terrestrial exoplanets provide valuable information about the planetary surface. Applying the surface reconstruction method proposed by Fujii et al. (2010) to both diurnal and annual variations of the scattered light,…
Resolving spatially-varying exoplanet features from single-point light curves is essential for determining whether Earth-like worlds harbor geological features and/or climate systems that influence habitability. To evaluate the feasibility…
Future space telescopes will directly image extrasolar planets at visible wavelengths. Time-resolved reflected light from an exoplanet encodes information about atmospheric and surface inhomogeneities. Previous research has shown that the…
We use a planetary albedo model to investigate variations in visible wavelength phase curves of exoplanets. The presence of clouds on these exoplanets significantly alters their planetary albedo spectra. We confirm that non-uniform cloud…
Unmixing the disk-integrated spectra of exoplanets provides hints about heterogeneous surfaces that we cannot directly resolve in the foreseeable future. It is particularly important for terrestrial planets with diverse surface compositions…
Future telescopes will characterize rocky exoplanets in reflected light, revealing their albedo, which depends on surface, cloud, and atmospheric properties. Identifying these features is crucial for assessing habitability. We present…
Finding potential life harboring exo-Earths is one of the aims of exoplanetary science. Detecting signatures of life in exoplanets will likely first be accomplished by determining the bulk composition of the planetary atmosphere via…
Photometric phase curves provide an important window onto exoplanetary atmospheres and potentially even their surfaces. With similar amplitudes to occultations but far longer baselines, they have a higher sensitivity to planetary photons at…
Context. Clouds have already been detected in exoplanetary atmospheres. They play crucial roles in a planet's atmosphere and climate and can also create ambiguities in the determination of atmospheric parameters such as trace gas mixing…
The detection and characterization of potentially habitable exoplanets is one of the chief goals of astrophysics for the coming decades. Imaging in reflected light is well suited for characterizing Earth-like planets, as much can be learned…
Seeing oceans, continents, quasi-static weather, and other surface features on exoplanets may allow us to detect and characterize life outside the solar system. The Proxima b planet resides within the stellar habitable zone allowing for…
To date, a handful of exoplanets have been photometrically mapped using phase-modulated reflection or emission from their surfaces, but the small amplitudes of such signals have limited previous maps almost exclusively to coarse dipolar…
The search for extrasolar planets has already detected rocky planets and several planetary candidates with minimum masses that are consistent with rocky planets in the habitable zone of their host stars. A low-resolution spectrum in the…