No Arabic abstract
A growing number (over 100!) of extra-solar planets (ESPs) have been discovered by transit photometry, and these systems are important because the transit strongly constrains their orbital inclination and allows accurate physical parameters for the planet to be derived, especially their radii. Their mass-radius relation allows us to probe their internal structure. In the present work we calculate Safronov numbers for the current sample of ESP and compare their masses and radii to current models with the goal of obtaining better constrains on their formation processe. Our calculation of Safronov numbers for the current TESP sample does show 2 classes, although about 20% lie above the formal Class I definition. These trends and recent results that argue against a useful distinction between Safronov classes are under further investigation. Mass-radius relations for the current sample of TESP are inconsistent with ESP models with very large core masses (geq 100 Moplus). Most TESP with radii near 1RJ are consistent with models with no core mass or core masses of 10 Moplus . The inflated planets, with radii geq 1.2 RJ are not consistent with current ESP models, but may lie along the lower end of models for brown dwarfs. Although such models are nascent, it is important to establish trends for the current sample of ESP, which will further the understanding of their formation and evolution.
The measurement of the light scattered from extrasolar planets informs atmospheric and formation models. With the discovery of many hot Jupiter planets orbiting nearby stars, this motivates the development of robust methods of characterisation from follow up observations. In this paper we discuss two methods for determining the planetary albedo in transiting systems. First, the most widely used method for measuring the light scattered by hot Jupiters (Collier Cameron et al.) is investigated for application for typical echelle spectra of a transiting planet system, showing that detection requires high signal-to-noise ratio data of bright planets. Secondly a new Fourier analysis method is also presented, which is model-independent and utilises the benefits of the reduced number of unknown parameters in transiting systems. This approach involves solving for the planet and stellar spectra in Fourier space by least-squares. The sensitivities of the methods are determined via Monte Carlo simulations for a range of planet-to-star fluxes. We find the Fourier analysis method to be better suited to the ideal case of typical observations of a well constrained transiting system than the Collier Cameron et al. method. We apply the Fourier analysis method for extracting the light scattered by transiting hot Jupiters from high resolution spectra to echelle spectra of HD 209458 and HD 189733. Unfortunately we are unable to improve on the previous upper limit of the planet-to-star flux for HD 209458b set by space-based observations. A 1{sigma}upper limit on the planet-to-star flux of HD 189733b is measured in the wavelength range of 558.83-599.56 nm yielding {epsilon} < 4.5 times 10-4. Improvement in the measurement of the upper limit of the planet-to-star flux of this system, with ground-based capabilities, requires data with a higher signal-to-noise ratio, and increased stability of the telescope.
Jovian planet formation has been shown to be strongly correlated with host star metallicity, which is thought to be a proxy for disk solids. Observationally, previous works have indicated that jovian planets preferentially form around stars with solar and super solar metallicities. Given these findings, it is challenging to form planets within metal-poor environments, particularly for hot Jupiters that are thought to form via metallicity-dependent core accretion. Although previous studies have conducted planet searches for hot Jupiters around metal-poor stars, they have been limited due to small sample sizes, which are a result of a lack of high-quality data making hot Jupiter occurrence within the metal-poor regime difficult to constrain until now. We use a large sample of halo stars observed by TESS to constrain the upper limit of hot Jupiter occurrence within the metal-poor regime (-2.0 $leq$ [Fe/H] $leq$ -0.6). Placing the most stringent upper limit on hot Jupiter occurrence, we find the mean 1-$sigma$ upper limit to be 0.18 $%$ for radii 0.8 -2 R$_{rm{Jupiter}}$ and periods $0.5- 10$ days. This result is consistent with previous predictions indicating that there exists a certain metallicity below which no planets can form.
In this research, 14 light curves of 10 hot Jupiter exoplanets available on Exoplanet Transit Database (ETD) were analyzed. We extracted the transit parameters using EXOFAST software. Finally, we compared the planets radius parameter calculated by the EXOFAST with the value at the NASA Exoplanet Archive (NEA) using the confidence interval method. According to the results obtained from this comparison, there is an acceptable match for the planets radius with NEA values. Also, based on the average value of 350 mm optics in this study, it shows that the results obtained using small telescopes can be very significant if there is appropriate observational skill to study more discovered planets.
We report the discovery from K2 of two transiting hot Jupiter systems. K2-295 (observed in Campaign 8) is a K5 dwarf which hosts a planet slightly smaller than Jupiter, orbiting with a period of 4.0 d. We have made an independent discovery of K2-237 b (Campaign 11), which orbits an F6 dwarf every 2.2 d and has an inflated radius 50 - 60 per cent larger than that of Jupiter. We use high-precision radial velocity measurements, obtained using the HARPS and FIES spectrographs, to measure the planetary masses. We find that K2-295 b has a similar mass to Saturn, while K2-237 b is a little more massive than Jupiter.
Using a 3D GCM, we create dynamical model atmospheres of a representative transiting giant exoplanet, HD 209458b. We post-process these atmospheres with an opacity code to obtain transit radius spectra during the primary transit. Using a spectral atmosphere code, we integrate over the face of the planet seen by an observer at various orbital phases and calculate light curves as a function of wavelength and for different photometric bands. The products of this study are generic predictions for the phase variations of a zero-eccentricity giant planets transit spectrum and of its light curves. We find that for these models the temporal variations in all quantities and the ingress/egress contrasts in the transit radii are small ($< 1.0$%). Moreover, we determine that the day/night contrasts and phase shifts of the brightness peaks relative to the ephemeris are functions of photometric band. The $J$, $H$, and $K$ bands are shifted most, while the IRAC bands are shifted least. Therefore, we verify that the magnitude of the downwind shift in the planetary ``hot spot due to equatorial winds is strongly wavelength-dependent. The phase and wavelength dependence of light curves, and the associated day/night contrasts, can be used to constrain the circulation regime of irradiated giant planets and to probe different pressure levels of a hot Jupiter atmosphere. We posit that though our calculations focus on models of HD 209458b similar calculations for other transiting hot Jupiters in low-eccentricity orbits should yield transit spectra and light curves of a similar character.