Related papers: Stellar Models Also Limit Exoplanet Atmosphere Stu…
We are on the verge of characterizing the atmospheres of terrestrial exoplanets in the habitable zones of M dwarf stars. Due to their large planet-to-star radius ratios and higher frequency of transits, terrestrial exoplanets orbiting M…
Detecting and characterising exoplanet atmospheres remains challenging because atmospheric signals can be comparable to residual noise and instrumental/astrophysical systematics. Spectral features span from a few ppm for small planets up to…
Transmission spectroscopy is currently the technique best suited to study a wide range of planetary atmospheres, leveraging the filtering of a star's light by a planet's atmosphere rather than its own emission. However, as both a planet and…
The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) is predicted to make great advances in the field of exoplanet atmospheres. Its 25 m2 mirror means that it can reach unprecedented levels of precision in observations of transit spectra, and can thus…
Clouds are ubiquitous in extrasolar planet atmospheres and are critical to our understanding of planetary climate and chemistry. They also represent one of the greater challenges to overcome when trying to interpret transit transmission…
We have entered the era of the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST). We use the first JWST transmission spectrum of the hot Saturn-mass exoplanet, WASP-39 b, obtained with the NIRSpec instrument in the 3-5 $\mu$m range to investigate (a) what…
The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) has provided the first opportunity to study the atmospheres of terrestrial exoplanets and estimate their surface conditions. Earth-sized planets around Sun-like stars are currently inaccessible with…
Transmission spectra are differential measurements that utilize stellar illumination to probe transiting exoplanet atmospheres. Any spectral difference between the illuminating light source and the disk-integrated stellar spectrum due to…
Differential spectroscopy during exoplanet transits permits to reconstruct spectra of small stellar surface portions that successively become hidden behind the planet. The center-to-limb behavior of stellar line shapes, asymmetries and…
Observed exoplanet transit spectra are usually retrieved using 1D models to determine atmospheric composition while planetary atmospheres are 3D. With the JWST and future space telescopes such as Ariel, we will be able to obtain…
Observing exoplanets through transmission spectroscopy supplies detailed information on their atmospheric composition, physics, and chemistry. Prior to JWST, these observations were limited to a narrow wavelength range across the…
The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) will provide an opportunity to investigate the atmospheres of potentially habitable planets. Aerosols, significantly mute molecular features in transit spectra because they prevent light from probing…
Exoplanet properties depend on how well the host star is characterized. For instance, the stellar atmospheric parameters (i.e., effective temperature, surface gravity and overall metallicity) are needed to derive the stellar mass and radius…
Most models used to predict or fit exoplanet transmission spectra do not include all the effects of atmospheric refraction. Namely, the angular size of the star with respect to the planet can limit the lowest altitude, or highest density…
We explore how well James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) spectra will likely constrain bulk atmospheric properties of transiting exoplanets. We start by modeling the atmospheres of archetypal hot Jupiter, warm Neptune, warm sub-Neptune, and…
One of the most prolific methods of studying exoplanet atmospheres is transmission spectroscopy, which measures the difference between the depth of an exoplanet's transit signal at various wavelengths and attempts to correlate the depth…
The field of exoplanet atmospheric characterization has recently made considerable advances with the advent of high-resolution spectroscopy from large ground-based telescopes and the commissioning of the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST).…
The surface characterization of rocky exoplanets via emission spectroscopy represents a frontier of current (JWST) and future (HWO) observational efforts. Here, we implement new features in the open-source retrieval code $\texttt{POSEIDON…
A key goal of exoplanet spectroscopy is to measure atmospheric properties, such as abundances of chemical species, in order to connect them to our understanding of atmospheric physics and planet formation. In this new era of high-quality…
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…