Related papers: Phase light curves for extrasolar Jupiters and Sat…
With the new generation of space telescopes such as the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), it is possible to better characterize the atmospheres of exoplanets. The atmospheres of Hot and Ultra Hot Jupiters are highly heterogeneous and…
We discuss the nature of rings that may exist around extrasolar planets. Taking the general properties of rings around the gas giants in the Solar System, we infer the likely properties of rings around exoplanets that reside inside the ice…
Mapping exoplanets across phases and during secondary eclipse is a powerful technique for characterizing Hot Jupiters in emission. Since these planets are expected to rotate about axes normal to their orbital planes, with rotation periods…
(Abridged) The solar system gas giant planets are oblate due to their rapid rotation. A measurement of the planet's projected oblateness would constrain the planet's rotational period. Planets that are synchronously rotating with their…
We investigate the prospects for characterizing extrasolar giant planets by measuring planetary oblateness from transit photometry and inferring planetary rotational periods. The rotation rates of planets in the solar system vary widely,…
It is well-known that the light curve of a transiting planet contains information about the planet's orbital period and size relative to the host star. More recently, it has been demonstrated that a tight constraint on an individual…
The shape of the two gas giants, Jupiter and Saturn, is determined primarily by their rotation rate, and interior density distribution. It is also affected by their zonal winds, causing an anomaly of O(10 km) at low latitudes. However,…
Recent observations revealed that several extremely low-density exoplanets show featureless transmission spectra. While atmospheric aerosols are a promising explanation for both the low density and featureless spectra, there is another…
Rotational modulations are observed on brown dwarfs and directly imaged exoplanets, but the underlying mechanism is not well understood. Here, we analyze Jupiter's rotational light curves at 12 wavelengths from the ultraviolet (UV) to the…
Since the discovery of the first exoplanets, those most adequate for life to begin and evolve have been sought. Due to observational bias, however, most of the discovered planets so far are gas giants, precluding their habitability.…
For extrasolar planets with orbital periods, P>10 days, radial velocity surveys find non-circular orbital eccentricities are common, <e>~0.3. Future surveys for extrasolar planets using the transit technique will also have sensitivity to…
A reasonable basis for future astronomical investigations of exoplanets lies in our best knowledge of the planets and satellites in the Solar System. Solar System bodies exhibit a wide variety of surface environments, even including…
[Abridged] The transmission of light through a planetary atmosphere can be studied as a function of altitude and wavelength using stellar or solar occultations, giving often unique constraints on the atmospheric composition. For exoplanets,…
In this paper, we investigate the detectability of radio emission from exoplanets, especially hot Jupiters, which are magnified by gravitational microlensing. Because hot Jupiters have orbital periods much shorter than the characteristic…
Planets and moons in our Solar System have strongly peaked reflected light phase curves at opposition. In this work, we produce a modified reflected light phase curve model and use it to fit the Cassini phase curves of Jupiter and…
With the recent discoveries of hundreds of extrasolar planets, the search for planets like Earth and life in the universe, is quickly gaining momentum. In the future, large space observatories could directly detect the light scattered from…
It is the most appropriate time to characterize the Earth-like exoplanets in order to detect biosignature beyond the Earth because such exoplanets will be the prime targets of big-budget missions like JWST, Roman Space Telescope, HabEx,…
The direct detection of new extrasolar planets from high-precision photometry data is commonly based on the observation of the transit signal of the planet as it passes in front of its star. Close-in planets, however, leave additional…
Specularly reflected light, or glint, from an ocean surface may provide a useful observational tool for studying extrasolar terrestrial planets. Detection of sea-surface glints would differentiate ocean-bearing terrestrial planets, i.e.…
Planetary companions to the source stars of a caustic-crossing binary microlensing events can be detected via the deviation from the parent light curves created when the caustic magnifies the star light reflecting off the atmosphere or…