No Arabic abstract
As exoplanetary science matures into its third decade, we are increasingly offered the possibility of pre existing, archival observations for newly detected candidates. This is particularly poignant for the TESS mission, whose survey spans bright, nearby dwarf stars in both hemispheres, which are precisely the types of sources targeted by previous radial velocity (RV) surveys. On this basis, we investigated whether any of the TESS Objects of Interest (TOIs) coincided with such observations, from which we find 18 single planet candidate systems. Of these, one exhibits an RV signature that has the correct period and phase matching the transiting planetary candidate with a false alarm probability of less than 1 percent. After further checks, we exploit this fact to validate HD 183579b (TOI-1055b). This planet is less than 4 Earth Radii and has better than 33 percent planetary mass measurements, thus advancing the TESS primary objective of finding 50 such worlds. We find that this planet is amongst the most accessible small transiting planets for atmospheric characterization. Our work highlights that the efforts to confirm and even precisely measure the masses of new transiting planet candidates need not always depend on acquiring new observations - that in some instances these tasks can be completed with existing data.
We report the discovery and characterization of a transiting warm sub-Neptune planet around the nearby bright ($V=8.75$ mag, $K=7.15$ mag) solar twin HD 183579, delivered by the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS). The host star is located $56.8pm0.1$ pc away with a radius of $R_{ast}=0.97pm0.02 R_{odot}$ and a mass of $M_{ast}=1.03pm0.05 M_{odot}$. We confirm the planetary nature by combining space and ground-based photometry, spectroscopy, and imaging. We find that HD 183579b (TOI-1055b) has a radius of $R_{p}=3.53pm0.13 R_{oplus}$ on a $17.47$ day orbit with a mass of $M_{p}=11.2pm5.4 M_{oplus}$ ($3sigma$ mass upper limit of $27.4 M_{oplus}$). HD 183579b is the fifth brightest known sub-Neptune planet system in the sky, making it an excellent target for future studies of the interior structure and atmospheric properties. By performing a line-by-line differential analysis using the high resolution and signal-to-noise ratio HARPS spectra, we find that HD 183579 joins the typical solar twin sample, without a statistically significant refractory element depletion.
We report the discovery of HD 110113 b (TOI-755.01), a transiting mini-Neptune exoplanet on a 2.5-day orbit around the solar-analogue HD 110113 (Teff = 5730K). Using TESS photometry and HARPS radial velocities gathered by the NCORES program, we find HD 110113 b has a radius of $2.05pm0.12$ $R_oplus$ and a mass of $4.55pm0.62$ $M_oplus$. The resulting density of $2.90^{+0.75}_{-0.59}$ g cm^{-3} is significantly lower than would be expected from a pure-rock world; therefore, HD 110113 b must be a mini-Neptune with a significant volatile atmosphere. The high incident flux places it within the so-called radius valley; however, HD 110113 b was able to hold onto a substantial (0.1-1%) H-He atmosphere over its $sim4$ Gyr lifetime. Through a novel simultaneous gaussian process fit to multiple activity indicators, we were also able to fit for the strong stellar rotation signal with period $20.8pm1.2$ d from the RVs and confirm an additional non-transiting planet with a mass of $10.5pm1.2$ $M_oplus$ and a period of $6.744^{+0.008}_{-0.009}$ d.
We present a comprehensive analysis of 10 years of HARPS radial velocities of the K2V dwarf star HD 13808, which has previously been reported to host two unconfirmed planet candidates. We use the state-of-the-art nested sampling algorithm PolyChord to compare a wide variety of stellar activity models, including simple models exploiting linear correlations between RVs and stellar activity indicators, harmonic models for the activity signals, and a more sophisticated Gaussian process regression model. We show that the use of overly-simplistic stellar activity models that are not well-motivated physically can lead to spurious `detections of planetary signals that are almost certainly not real. We also reveal some difficulties inherent in parameter and model inference in cases where multiple planetary signals may be present. Our study thus underlines the importance both of exploring a variety of competing models and of understanding the limitations and precision settings of ones sampling algorithm. We also show that at least in the case of HD 13808, we always arrive at consistent conclusions about two particular signals present in the RV, regardless of the stellar activity model we adopt; these two signals correspond to the previously-reported though unconfirmed planet candidate signals. Given the robustness and precision with which we can characterize these two signals, we deem them secure planet detections. In particular, we find two planets orbiting HD 13808 at distances of 0.11, 0.26 AU with periods of 14.2, 53.8 d, and minimum masses of 11, 10 Earth masses.
HD~105 is a nearby, pre-main sequence G0 star hosting a moderately bright debris disc ($L_{rm dust}/L_{star} sim 2.6times10^{-4}$). HD~105 and its surroundings might therefore be considered an analogue of the young Solar System. We refine the stellar parameters based on an improved Gaia parallax distance, identify it as a pre-main sequence star {with an age of 50~$pm$~16~Myr}. The circumstellar disc was marginally resolved by textit{Herschel}/PACS imaging at far-infrared wavelengths. Here we present an archival ALMA observation at 1.3~mm, revealing the extent and orientation of the disc. We also present textit{HST}/NICMOS and VLT/SPHERE near-infrared images, where we recover the disc in scattered light at the $geq$~5-$sigma$ level. This was achieved by employing a novel annular averaging technique, and is the first time this has been achieved for a disc in scattered light. Simultaneous modelling of the available photometry, disc architecture, and detection in scattered light allow better determination of the discs architecture, and dust grain minimum size, composition, and albedo. We measure the dust albedo to lie between 0.19 and 0.06, the lower value being consistent with Edgeworth-Kuiper belt objects.
We report the discovery of a warm sub-Saturn, TOI-257b (HD 19916b), based on data from NASAs Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS). The transit signal was detected by TESS and confirmed to be of planetary origin based on radial velocity observations. An analysis of the TESS photometry, the Minerva-Australis, FEROS, and HARPS radial velocities, and the asteroseismic data of the stellar oscillations reveals that TOI-257b has a mass of $M_P=0.138pm0.023$,$rm{M_J}$ ($43.9pm7.3$,$M_{rm oplus}$), a radius of $R_P=0.639pm0.013$,$rm{R_J}$ ($7.16pm0.15$,$R_{rm oplus}$), bulk density of $0.65^{+0.12}_{-0.11}$ (cgs), and period $18.38818^{+0.00085}_{-0.00084}$,$rm{days}$. TOI-257b orbits a bright ($mathrm{V}=7.612$,mag) somewhat evolved late F-type star with $M_*=1.390pm0.046$,$rm{M_{odot}}$, $R_*=1.888pm0.033$,$rm{R_{odot}}$, $T_{rm eff}=6075pm90$,$rm{K}$, and $vsin{i}=11.3pm0.5$,km,s$^{-1}$. Additionally, we find hints for a second non-transiting sub-Saturn mass planet on a $sim71$,day orbit using the radial velocity data. This system joins the ranks of a small number of exoplanet host stars ($sim100$) that have been characterized with asteroseismology. Warm sub-Saturns are rare in the known sample of exoplanets, and thus the discovery of TOI-257b is important in the context of future work studying the formation and migration history of similar planetary systems.