Related papers: Stellar pulsations interfering with the transit li…
Context. The spectra of fast-rotating A-type stars have strongly broadened absorption lines. This effect causes blending of the absorption lines, hindering the measurement of the abundances of the elements that are in the stellar…
We present a way of searching for non-transiting exoplanets with dusty tails. In the transiting case, the extinction by dust during the transit removes more light from the beam than is scattered into it. Thus, the forward scattering…
Differences in the ingress and egress shapes of transit light curves can indicate morning-evening temperature contrasts on transiting planets. Here, we pinpoint an alternative mechanism that can introduce asymmetries in transit light…
The probability that an exoplanet transits its host star is high for planets in close orbits, but drops off rapidly for increasing semimajor axes. This makes transit surveys for planets with large semimajor axes orbiting bright stars…
Recent observations of rapidly rotating stars have revealed the presence of regular patterns in their pulsation spectra. This has raised the question as to their physical origin, and in particular, whether they can be explained by an…
The power of asteroseismology relies on the ability to infer the stellar structure from the unambiguous frequency identification of the corresponding pulsation mode. Hence, the use of a Fourier transform is in the basis of asteroseismic…
A planetary transit produces both a photometric signal and a spectroscopic signal. Precise observations of the transit light curve reveal the planetary radius and allow a search for timing anomalies caused by satellites or additional…
When studying transiting exoplanets it is common to assume a spherical planet shape. However short rotational periods can cause a planet to bulge at its equator, as is the case with Saturn whose equatorial radius is almost 10% larger than…
When exoplanets pass in front of their stars, they imprint a transit signature on the stellar light curve which to date has been assumed to be symmetric in time, owing to the planet being modelled as a circular area occulting the stellar…
Exoplanet transmission spectra, which measure the absorption of light passing through a planet's atmosphere during transit, are most often assessed globally, resulting in a single spectrum per planetary atmosphere. However, the inherent…
I derive the physical properties of 30 transiting extrasolar planetary systems using a homogeneous analysis of published data. The light curves are modelled with the JKTEBOP code, with attention paid to limb darkening and eccentricity. The…
Among asteroids there exist ambiguities in their rotation period determinations. They are due to incomplete coverage of the rotation, noise and/or aliases resulting from gaps between separate lightcurves. To help to remove such…
We discuss the interpretation of distortions to stellar spectral lines with particular attention to line bisectors in the presence of an orbiting planetary companion. We present a simple model whereby light reflected by the companion can…
Limb-darkening is fundamental in determining transit lightcurve shapes, and is typically modeled by a variety of laws that parametrize the intensity profile of the star that is being transited. Confronted with a transit lightcurve, some…
Non-Keplerian dynamics of planetary orbits manifest in the transit light-curve as variations of different types. In addition to Transit Timing Variations (TTV's), the shape of the transits contains additional information on variations in…
Transit timing variations (TTVs) of exoplanets are normally interpreted as the consequence of gravitational interaction with additional bodies in the system. However, TTVs can also be caused by deformations of the system transits by…
While galaxy rotation curves provide one of the most powerful methods for measuring dark matter profiles in the inner regions of rotation-supported galaxies, at the dwarf scale there are factors that can complicate this analysis. Given the…
Ultra-light axion-like particles (ALPs) can be a viable solution to the dark matter problem. The scalar field associated with ALPs, coupled to the electromagnetic field, acts as an active birefringent medium, altering the polarisation…
We present exact analytic formulae for the eclipse of a star described by quadratic or nonlinear limb darkening. In the limit that the planet radius is less than a tenth of the stellar radius, we show that the exact lightcurve can be well…
Context. Correlated noise in exoplanet light curves, such as noise from stellar activity, convection noise, and instrumental noise, distorts the exoplanet transit light curves and leads to biases in the best-fit transit parameters. An…