Related papers: Planetary transits and stellar variability
We present the results of an automated variability analysis of the Kepler public data measured in the first quarter (Q1) of the mission. In total, about 150 000 light curves have been analysed to detect stellar variability, and to identify…
Context: CoRoT is a pioneering space mission devoted to the analysis of stellar variability and the photometric detection of extrasolar planets. Aims: We present the list of planetary transit candidates detected in the first field observed…
Statistical analyses of large surveys for transiting planets such as the Kepler mission must account for systematic errors and biases. Transit detection depends not only on the planet's radius and orbital period, but also on host star…
One of the primary mission goals of the Kepler space telescope was to detect Earth-like terrestrial planets in the habitable zone around Sun-like stars. These planets are at the detection limit, where the Kepler detection and vetting…
The increasing number of transiting exoplanets sparked a significant interest in discovering their moons. Most of the methods in the literature utilize timing analysis of the raw light curves. Here we propose a new approach for the direct…
Transiting extrasolar planets constitute only a small fraction of the range of stellar systems found to display periodic, shallow dimmings in wide-field surveys employing small-aperture camera arrays. Here we present an efficient selection…
Photometric follow-ups of transiting exoplanets (TEPs) may lead to discoveries of additional, less massive bodies in extrasolar systems. This is possible by detecting and then analysing variations in transit timing of transiting exoplanets.…
Theoretical studies predict that Trojans are likely a frequent byproduct of planet formation and evolution. We examine the sensitivity of transit timing observations for detecting Trojan companions to transiting extrasolar planets. We…
Because the planets of a system form in a flattened disk, they are expected to share similar orbital inclinations at the end of their formation. The high-precision photometric monitoring of stars known to host a transiting planet could thus…
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…
Since the discovery of the first exoplanets more than 20 years ago, there has been an increasing need for photometric and spectroscopic models to characterize these systems. While imaging has been used extensively for Solar System bodies…
The exoplanet detection is the most exciting and challenging field of astronomy. The discovery of many exoplanets has revolutionized our understanding of the formation and evolution of planetary systems and has showed new ways to search for…
Radial velocity (RV) planet searches are increasingly finding planets with small velocity amplitudes, with long orbital periods, or in multiple planet systems. Bayesian inference has the potential to improve the interpretation of existing…
The detection of thousands of extrasolar planets by the transit method naturally raises the question of whether potential extrasolar observers could detect the transits of the Solar System planets. We present a comprehensive analysis of the…
Planetary transits provide a unique opportunity to investigate the surface distributions of star spots. Our aim is to determine if, with continuous observation (such as the data that will be provided by the Kepler mission), we can in…
Grazing transits present a special problem for statistical studies of exoplanets. Even though grazing planetary orbits are rare (due to geometric selection effects), for many low to moderate signal-to-noise cases, a significant fraction of…
In a transiting planetary system, the presence of a second planet will cause the time interval between transits to vary. These transit timing variations (TTV) are particularly large near mean-motion resonances and can be used to infer the…
(Abridged) We discuss the design considerations of the EXPLORE (EXtra-solar PLanet Occultation REsearch) project, a series of transiting planet searches using 4-m-class telescopes to continuously monitor a single field of stars in the…
We analyse the respective benefits and drawbacks of ground-based and space-based transit surveys for extrasolar planets. Based on simple but realistic assumptions about the fraction of lower main sequence stars harboring telluric and giant…
Aims: We describe a fast, robust and automatic detection algorithm, TRUFAS, and apply it to data that are being expected from the CoRoT mission. Methods: The procedure proposed for the detection of planetary transits in light curves works…