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CONTEXT. It is theoretically possible for rings to have formed around extrasolar planets in a similar way to that in which they formed around the giant planets in our solar system. However, no such rings have been detected to date. AIMS: We…
We present theoretical predictions for photometric and spectroscopic signatures of rings around transiting extrasolar planets. On the basis of a general formulation for the transiting signature in the stellar light curve and the velocity…
Digital co-addition of astronomical images is a common technique for increasing signal-to-noise and image depth. A modification of this simple technique has been applied to the detection of minor bodies in the Solar System: first stationary…
The astrometry technique is an important tool for detecting and characterizing exoplanets of different type. In this review, the different projects which are either operating, in construction or in discussion are presented and their…
The yields from transit surveys can be used to constrain the frequency and statistical properties of extrasolar planets. Conversely, planet frequencies can be used to estimate expected detection rates, which are critical for the planning…
Just as the ordinary Doppler effect serves as a tool to measure radial velocities of celestial objects, so can the relativistic Doppler effect be implemented to measure a combination of radial and transverse velocities by using recent…
Photometry with the transit method has arguably been the most successful exoplanet discovery method to date. A short overview about the rise of that method to its present status is given. The method's strength is the rich set of parameters…
To date, the ability for observers to reveal the composition or thermal structure of an exoplanet's atmosphere has rested on two techniques: high-contrast direct imaging and time-series observations of transiting exoplanets. The former is…
The Large Synoptic Survey Telescope (LSST) will photometrically monitor approximately 1 billion stars for ten years. The resulting light curves can be used to detect transiting exoplanets. In particular, as demonstrated by Lund et al.…
We introduce EXOFIT, a Bayesian tool for estimating orbital parameters of extrasolar planets from radial velocity measurements. EXOFIT can search for either one or two planets at present. EXOFIT employs Markov Chain Monte Carlo method…
One of the great quests of astronomy is to obtain the spectrum of a terrestrial planet orbiting within the habitable zone of its star, and the dominant challenge in doing so is to isolate the light of the planet from that of the star.…
The Space Interferometry Mission (SIM) is expected to make precise astrometric measurements that can be used to detect low mass planets around nearby stars. Since most nearby stars are members of multiple star systems, many stars will have…
The timing method, using either stellar pulsations or eclipse timing of close binaries as a clock, is proving to be an efficient way to detect planets around stars that have evolved beyond the red giant branch. In this article we present a…
We demonstrate that extremely rapid and weak periodic and non-periodic signals can easily be detected by using the autocorrelation of intensity as a function of time. We use standard radio-astronomical observations that have artificial…
Stellar surface processes represent a fundamental limit to the detection of extrasolar planets with the currently most heavily-used techniques. As such, considerable effort has gone into trying to mitigate the impact of these processes on…
In this paper, we review the various ways in which an infrared stellar interferometer can be used to perform direct detection of extrasolar planetary systems. We first review the techniques based on classical stellar interferometry, where…
The identification of mean motion resonances in exoplanetary systems or in the Solar System might be cumbersome when several planets and large number of smaller bodies are to be considered. Based on the geometrical meaning of the resonance…
NASA's Kepler Space Telescope has successfully discovered thousands of exoplanet candidates using the transit method, including hundreds of stars with multiple transiting planets. In order to estimate the frequency of these valuable…
Most current high contrast imaging point spread function (PSF) subtraction algorithms use some form of a least-squares noise minimization to find exoplanets that are, before post-processing, often hidden below the instrumental speckle…
Jupiter-mass planets with large semi-major axes ($a > 1.0$ AU) occur at a higher rate around evolved intermediate mass stars. There is a pronounced paucity of close-in ($a < 0.6$ AU), intermediate period ($5 < P < 100$ days), low-mass…