Related papers: Biases in Exoplanet Transmission Spectra Introduce…
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…
Transmission spectroscopy is a promising tool for the atmospheric characterization of transiting exoplanets. Because the planetary signal is faint, discrepancies have been reported regarding individual targets. We investigate the dependence…
The transit method, employed by MOST, \emph{Kepler}, and various ground-based surveys has enabled the characterization of extrasolar planets to unprecedented precision. These results are precise enough to begin to measure planet atmosphere…
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 ability to observe extrasolar planets transiting their stars has profoundly changed our understanding of these planetary systems. However, these measurements depend on how well we understand the properties of the host star, such as…
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…
This paper examines how to compare stellar limb-darkening coefficients evaluated from model atmospheres with those derived from photometry. Different characterizations of a given model atmosphere can give quite different numerical results…
Very precise measurements of exoplanet transit lightcurves both from ground and space based observatories make it now possible to fit the limb-darkening coefficients in the transit-fitting procedure rather than fix them to theoretical…
This paper is part of an effort to correct the transmission spectra of a transiting planet orbiting an active star. In Paper I (Cracchiolo et al. 2020) we have demonstrated a methodology to minimize the potential bias induced by unocculted…
Stellar limb darkening must be properly accounted for to accurately determine the radii of exoplanets at various wavelengths. The standard approach to address limb darkening involves either using laws with coefficients from modelled stellar…
The light curve of an exoplanetary transit can be used to estimate the planetary radius and other parameters of interest. Because accurate parameter estimation is a non-analytic and computationally intensive problem, it is often useful to…
The light curve of an exoplanetary transit can be used to estimate the planetary radius and other parameters of interest. Because accurate parameter estimation is a non-analytic and computationally intensive problem, it is often useful to…
Although the main goal of the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (\textit{TESS}) is to search for new transiting exoplanets, its data can also be used to study in further detail already known systems. The \textit{TESS} bandpass is…
We re-visit the principles of transmission spectroscopy for transiting extrasolar planets, focusing on the overlap between the planetary spectrum and the illuminating stellar spectrum. Virtually all current models of exoplanetary…
Determining wavelength-dependent exoplanet radii measurements is an excellent way to probe the composition of exoplanet atmospheres. In light of this, Borsa et al. (2016) sought to develop a technique to obtain such measurements by…
We study how the precision of the exoplanet radius determination is affected by our present knowledge of limb darkening in two cases: when we fix the limb darkening coefficients and when we adjust them. We also investigate the effects of…
The depth of an exoplanetary transit in the light curve of a distant star is commonly approximated as the squared planet-to-star radius ratio, (R_p/R_s)^2. Stellar limb darkening, however, results in significantly deeper transits. Here we…
Stellar limb darkening is the observed variation in brightness of a star between its centre and edge (or limb) when viewed in the plane of the sky. Stellar brightness is maximal at the centre and then decreases radially and monotonically…
The occurrence of a planet transiting in front of its host star offers the opportunity to observe the planet's atmosphere filtering starlight. The fraction of occulted stellar flux is roughly proportional to the optically thick area of the…
We propose a new method for investigating atmospheric inhomogeneities in exoplanets through transmission spectroscopy. Our approach links chromatic variations in conventional transit model parameters (central transit time, total and full…