Related papers: Using long-term transit timing to detect terrestri…
I present a review of observational efforts to study known extrasolar planets by methods that are complementary to the radial velocity technique. I describe the current state of attempts to detect and characterize such planets by…
We investigate the linear polarization in the light of extrasolar planetary systems that may arise as a result of an occultation of the star by a transiting planet. Such an occultation breaks any spherical symmetry over the projected…
The Transit Timing Variations (TTVs) technique provides a powerful tool to detect additional planets in transiting exoplanetary systems. In this paper we show how transiting planets with significant TTVs can be systematically missed, or…
Recent analyses of Kepler space telescope data reveal that transiting planets with orbital periods shorter than about 2-3 days are generally observed around late-type stars with rotation periods longer than about 5-10 days. We investigate…
Orbits of known extrasolar planets that are located outside the tidal circularization regions of their parent stars are often substantially eccentric. By contrast, planetary orbits in our Solar System are approximately circular, reflecting…
The discovery of the first extra-solar planet surrounding a main-sequence star was announced in 1995, based on very precise radial velocity (Doppler) measurements. A total of 34 such planets were known by the end of March 2000, and their…
Both ground and space-based transit observatories are poised to significantly increase the number of known transiting planets and the number of precisely measured transit times. The variation in a planet's transit times may be used to infer…
Among other things, studies of the formation and evolution of planetary systems currently draw on two important observational resources: the precise characterization available for planets that transit their parent stars and the frequency…
Under the current microlensing planet search strategy of monitoring events caused by stellar-mass lenses, only planets located within a narrow region of separations from central stars can be effectively detected. However, with the dramatic…
The Rossiter-McLaughlin (RM) effect is the distortion of stellar spectral lines that occurs during eclipses or transits, due to stellar rotation. We assess the future prospects for using the RM effect to measure the alignment of planetary…
Two consecutive transits of planetary companion OGLE-TR-111b were observed in the I band. Combining these observations with data from the literature, we find that the timing of the transits cannot be explained by a constant period, and that…
We describe the long-term evolution of compact systems of terrestrial planets, using a set of simulations that match the statistical properties of the observed exoplanet distribution. The evolution is driven by tidal dissipation in the…
In close eclipsing binaries, measurements of the variations in binary's eclipse timing may be used to infer information about the existence of circumbinary objects. To determine the possibility of the detection of such variations with CoRoT…
A transiting planet eclipses part of the rotating stellar surface, thereby producing an anomalous Doppler shift of the stellar spectrum. Here I review how this "Rossiter-McLaughlin Effect" can be used to characterize exoplanetary systems.…
Star clusters provide an excellent opportunity to study the role of environment on determining the frequencies of short period planets. They provide a large sample of stars which can be imaged simultaneously, with a common distance, age and…
Planets close to their host stars are believed to undergo significant tidal interactions, leading to a progressive damping of the orbital eccentricity. Here we show that, when the orbit of the planet is excited by an outer companion, tidal…
As a planet transits the face of a star, it accelerates along the line-of-sight. The changing delay in the propagation of photons produces an apparent deceleration of the planet across the sky throughout the transit. This persistent…
The phase or orbital light curves of extrasolar terrestrial planets in reflected or emitted light will contain information about their atmospheres and surfaces complementary to data obtained by other techniques such as spectrosopy. We show…
We recommend an intensive effort to survey and understand the obliquity distribution of small close-in extrasolar planets over the coming decade. The orbital obliquities of exoplanets--i.e., the relative orientation between the planetary…
In transiting planetary systems, the angle between the orbital angular momentum and the stellar spin is usually constrained through the Rossiter-McLaughlin effect observed in radial velocity and can be subject to large uncertainties,…