Related papers: Resolving the Surfaces of Extrasolar Planets With …
The physical bases of the detection and characterisation of extrasolar planets in the reflected light and thermal emission regimes are reviewed. They both have their advantages and disadvantages, including artefacts, in the determination of…
Point source spectrophotometric ("single-point") light curves of Earth-like planets contain a surprising amount of information about the spatial features of those worlds. Spatially resolving these light curves is important for assessing…
High-resolution Doppler spectroscopy provides an avenue to study the atmosphere of both transiting and non-transiting planets. This powerful method has also yielded some of the most robust atmospheric detections to date. Currently,…
Clouds have been shown to be present in many exoplanetary atmospheres. Cloud formation modeling predicts considerable inhomogeneities of cloud cover, consistent with optical phase curve observations. However, optical phase curves cannot…
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…
We present results of numerical simulations of the flux (irradiance), F, and the degree of polarization (i.e. the ratio of polarized to total flux), P, of light that is reflected by Earth-like extrasolar planets orbiting solar-type stars,…
We propose a new method for investigating atmospheric inhomogeneities in exoplanets through transmission spectroscopy. Our approach links chromatic variations in conventional transit model parameters (central transit time, total and full…
The majority of exoplanets found to date have been discovered via the transit method, and transmission spectroscopy represents the primary method of studying these distant worlds. Currently, in-depth atmospheric characterization of…
The observed light curves of most eclipsing binaries and stars with transiting planets can be well described and interpreted by current advanced physical models which also allow for the determination of many physical parameters of eclipsing…
Recently the Spitzer Space Telescope observed the transiting extrasolar planets, TrES-1 and HD209458b. These observations have provided the first estimates of the day side thermal flux from two extrasolar planets orbiting Sun-like stars. In…
Rings around exoplanets (exorings) are one of the most expected discoveries in exoplanetary research. There is an increasing number of theoretical and observational efforts for detecting exorings, but none of them have succeeded yet. Most…
Ground-based observations of exoplanet eclipses provide important clues to the planets' atmospheric physics, yet systematics in light curve analyses are not fully understood. It is unknown if measurements suggesting near-infrared flux…
Polarimetry of extrasolar planets becomes a new tool for their investigation, which requires the development of diagnostic techniques and parameter case studies. Our goal is to develop a theoretical model which can be applied to interpret…
Close-in extrasolar giant planets are expected to cool their thermospheres by producing H3+ emission in the near-infrared (NIR), but simulations predict H3+ emission intensities that differ in the resulting intensity by several orders of…
We present a new method for differentiating between planetary transits and eclipsing binaries based on the presence of the ellipsoidal light variations. These variations can be used to detect stellar secondaries with masses ~0.2 M_sun…
We present a new few-parameter phenomenological model of light curves of eclipsing binaries and stars with transiting planets that is able to fit the observed light curves with the accuracy better than 1\% of their amplitudes. The model can…
Context. The photometric signal we receive from a star hosting a planet is modulated by the variation of the planet signal with its orbital phase. Such phase variations are observed for transiting hot Jupiters with current instrumentation,…
We report secondary eclipse photometry of the hot Jupiter XO-3b in the 4.5~$\mu$m band taken with the Infrared Array Camera (IRAC) on the Spitzer Space Telescope. We measure individual eclipse depths and center of eclipse times for a total…
We present photometry of the extrasolar planet WASP-5b in the 3.6 and 4.5 micron bands taken with the Spitzer Space Telescope's Infrared Array Camera as part of the extended warm mission. By examining the depth of the planet's secondary…
We analyze the surface structure of the planet host star CoRoT-2a using a consistent model for both the `global' (i.e., rotationally modulated) lightcurve and the transit lightcurves, using data provided by the CoRoT mission. Selecting a…