Related papers: On artificial transits feasibility and SETI
The Hubble Space Telescope is uniquely able to study planets that are observed to transit their parent stars. The extremely stable platform afforded by an orbiting spacecraft, free from the contaminating effects of the Earth's atmosphere,…
A transiting planet invites us to measure its size, mass, orbital parameters, atmospheric composition, and other characteristics. But the invitation can only be accepted if the host star is bright enough for precise measurements of its flux…
Eighty planetary systems of two or more planets are known to orbit stars other than the Sun. For most, the data can be sufficiently explained by non-interacting Keplerian orbits, so the dynamical interactions of these systems have not been…
Unlike hot Jupiters or other gas giants, super-Earths are expected to have a wide variety of compositions, ranging from terrestrial bodies like our own to more gaseous planets like Neptune. Observations of transiting systems, which allow us…
Main-sequence stars earlier than spectral type ~F6 or so are expected to rotate rapidly due to their radiative exteriors. This rapid rotation leads to an oblate stellar figure. It also induces the photosphere to be hotter (by up to several…
Precise physical properties of the known transiting exoplanets are essential for their precise atmospheric characterization using modern and upcoming instruments. Leveraging the large volume of high SNR photometric follow-up data from TESS,…
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…
The stellar obliquity of a transiting planetary system can be constrained by combining measurements of the star's rotation period, radius, and projected rotational velocity. Here we present a hierarchical Bayesian technique for recovering…
Despite the large amount of high quality data generated in recent space encounters with asteroids, the majority of our knowledge about these objects comes from ground based observations. Asteroids travelling in orbits that are potentially…
We analyze the properties of searches devoted to finding planetary transits by observing simple stellar systems, such as globular clusters, open clusters, and the Galactic bulge. We develop the analytic tools necessary to predict the number…
By observing the transits of exoplanets, one may determine many fundamental system parameters. I review current techniques and results for the parameters that can be measured with the greatest precision, specifically, the transit times, the…
The upcoming TESS mission is expected to find thousands of transiting planets around bright stars, yet for three-quarters of the fields observed the temporal coverage will limit discoveries to planets with orbital periods below 13.7 days.…
I present an initial investigation into a new planet detection technique that uses the transit timing of a known, transiting planet. The transits of a solitary planet orbiting a star occur at equally spaced intervals in time. If a second…
Stellar activity features such as spots can create complications in determining planetary parameters through spectroscopic and photometric observations. The overlap of a transiting planet and a stellar spot, for instance, can produce…
An analytical method is proposed in this work for verification whether an artificial earth satellite during its orbital motion passes over a region of the earth surface. The method is based on undisturbed Keppler's approximation of the…
Aims: We compare the apparent difference in timing of transiting planets (or eclipsing binaries) that are observed from widely separated locations (parallactic delay). Methods: A simple geometrical argument allow us to show that the…
We propose that the presence of additional planets in extrasolar planetary systems can be detected by long-term transit timing studies. If a transiting planet is on an eccentric orbit then the presence of another planet causes a secular…
We analyze potential effects of an extraterrestrial civilization's use of orbiting mirrors to illuminate the dark side of a synchronously rotating planet on planetary transit light curves. Previous efforts to detect civilizations based on…
Among the group of extrasolar planets, transiting planets provide a great opportunity to obtain direct measurements for the basic physical properties, such as mass and radius of these objects. These planets are therefore highly important in…
When studying transiting exoplanets it is common to assume a spherical planet shape. However short rotational periods can cause a planet to bulge at its equator, as is the case with Saturn whose equatorial radius is almost 10% larger than…