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The critical first step in the search for life on exoplanets over the next decade is to determine whether rocky planets transiting small M-dwarf stars possess atmospheres and, if so, what processes sculpt them over time. Because of its…
A number of transiting, potentially habitable Earth-sized exoplanets have recently been detected around several nearby M dwarf stars. These worlds represent important targets for atmospheric characterization for the upcoming NASA James Webb…
Transmission spectroscopy is still the preferred characterization technique for exoplanet atmospheres, although it presents unique challenges that translate into characterization bottlenecks when robust mitigation strategies are missing.…
Population studies of exoplanets are key to unlocking their statistical properties. So far the inferred properties have been mostly limited to planetary, orbital and stellar parameters extracted from, e.g., Kepler, radial velocity, and GAIA…
Secondary eclipse observations of several of the hottest hot Jupiters show featureless, blackbody-like spectra or molecular emission features, which are consistent with thermal inversions being present in those atmospheres. Theory predicts…
Mapping distant worlds is the next frontier for exoplanet infrared photometry studies. Ultimately, constraining spatial and temporal properties of an exoplanet atmosphere will provide further insight into its physics. For tidally-locked hot…
Characterization of the atmospheres of transiting exoplanets relies on accurate measurements of the extent of the optically thick area of the planet at multiple wavelengths with a precision $\lesssim$100 parts per million (ppm).…
The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) will devote significant observing time to the study of exoplanets. It will not be serviceable as was the Hubble Space Telescope, and therefore the spacecraft/instruments will have a relatively limited…
The orbital sampling effect (OSE) appears in phase-folded transit light curves of extrasolar planets with moons. Analytical OSE models have hitherto neglected stellar limb darkening and non-zero transit impact parameters and assumed that…
The JWST provides exoplanet transit observations with unprecedented spectral coverage, enabling detailed atmospheric characterisation. However, systematics introduced during data reduction can lead to small but significant uncertainties…
It is possible to learn a great deal about exoplanet atmospheres even when we cannot spatially resolve the planets from their host stars. In this chapter, we overview the basic techniques used to characterize transiting exoplanets -…
The search for signs of life in the Universe has entered a new phase with the advent of the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST). Detecting biosignature gases via exoplanet atmosphere transmission spectroscopy is in principle within JWST's…
Long-period transiting exoplanets provide an opportunity to study the mass-radius relation and internal structure of extrasolar planets. Their studies grant insights into planetary evolution akin to the Solar System planets, which, in…
The prevalence of atmospheres on rocky planets is one of the major questions in exoplanet astronomy, but there are currently no published unambiguous detections of atmospheres on any rocky exoplanets. The MIRI instrument on JWST can measure…
With a new generation of observatories coming online this decade, the process of characterizing exoplanet atmospheres will need to be reinvented. Currently mostly on the instrumental side, characterization bottlenecks will soon stand by the…
Measuring the metallicity and carbon-to-oxygen (C/O) ratio in exoplanet atmospheres is a fundamental step towards constraining the dominant chemical processes at work and, if in equilibrium, revealing planet formation histories.…
The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) will perform exoplanet transit spectroscopy in the coming decade promising transformative science results. All four instruments on board can be used for this technique which reconstructs the atmospheric…
We present a new first-principles analytic approach to interpreting eclipses and phase curves of rocky planets. Observations with JWST have reported nondetections of atmospheres around the majority of hot rocky planets orbiting M dwarfs.…
Understanding planet formation requires robust population studies, which are designed to reveal trends in planet properties. In this work, we aim to determine if different methods for selecting populations of exoplanets for atmospheric…
Rotation and orbital eccentricity both strongly influence planetary climate. Eccentricities can often be measured for exoplanets, but rotation rates are currently difficult or impossible to constrain. Here we examine how the combined…