Natalie M. Batalha, William J. Borucki, Stephen T. Bryson, Lars A. Buchhave, Douglas A. Caldwell, Jorgen Christensen-Dalsgaard, David Ciardi, Edward W. Dunham, … 展开作者
Natalie M. Batalha, William J. Borucki, Stephen T. Bryson, Lars A. Buchhave, Douglas A. Caldwell, Jorgen Christensen-Dalsgaard, David Ciardi, Edward W. Dunham, Francois Fressin, Thomas N. Gautier, Ronald L. Gilliland, Michael R. Haas, Steve B. Howell, Jon M. Jenkins, Hans Kjeldsen, David G. Koch, David W. Latham, Jack J. Lissauer, Geoffrey W. Marcy, Jason F. Rowe, Dimitar D. Sasselov, Sara Seager, Jason H. Steffen, Guillermo Torres, Gibor S. Basri, Timothy M. Brown, David Charbonneau, Jessie Christiansen, Bruce Clarke, William D. Cochran, Andrea Dupree, Daniel C. Fabrycky, Debra Fischer, Eric B. Ford, Jonathan Fortney, Forrest R. Girouard, Matthew J. Holman, John Johnson, Howard Isaacson, Todd C. Klaus, Pavel Machalek, Althea V. Moorehead, Robert C. Morehead, Darin Ragozzine, Peter Tenenbaum, Joseph Twicken, Samuel Quinn, Jeffrey VanCleve, Lucianne M. Walkowicz, William F. Welsh, Edna Devore, Alan Gould
备注：
Accepted, Astrophysical Journal, November 25, 2010; Eexpected publication date: February 20, 2011
NASA's Kepler Mission uses transit photometry to determine the frequency of earth-size planets in or near the habitable zone of Sun-like stars. The mission reached a milestone toward meeting that goal: the discovery of its first rocky planet, Kepler-10b. Two distinct sets of transit events were detected: 1) a 152 +/- 4 ppm dimming lasting 1.811 +/- 0.024 hours with ephemeris T[BJD]=2454964.57375+N*0.837495 days and 2) a 376 +/- 9 ppm dimming lasting 6.86 +/- 0.07 hours with ephemeris T[BJD]=2454971.6761+N*45.29485 days. Statistical tests on the photometric and pixel flux time series established the viability of the planet candidates triggering ground-based follow-up observations. Forty precision Doppler measurements were used to confirm that the short-period transit event is due to a planetary companion. The parent star is bright enough for asteroseismic analysis. Photometry was collected at 1-minute cadence for >4 months from which we detected 19 distinct pulsation frequencies. Modeling the frequencies resulted in precise knowledge of the fundamental stellar properties. Kepler-10 is a relatively old (11.9 +/- 4.5 Gyr) but otherwise Sun-like Main Sequence star with Teff=5627 +/- 44 K, Mstar=0.895 +/- 0.060 Msun, and Rstar=1.056 +/- 0.021 Rsun. Physical models simultaneously fit to the transit light curves and the precision Doppler measurements yielded tight constraints on the properties of Kepler-10b that speak to its rocky composition: Mpl=4.56 +/- 1.29 Mearth, Rpl=1.416 +/- 0.036 Rearth, and density=8.8 +/- 2.9 gcc. Kepler-10b is the smallest transiting exoplanet discovered to date.
The Kepler Mission has found thousands of planetary candidates with radii between 1 and 4 R$_\oplus$. These planets have no analogues in our own Solar System, providing an unprecedented opportunity to understand the range and distribution of planetary compositions allowed by planet formation and evolution. A precise mass measurement is usually required to constrain the possible composition of an individual super-Earth-sized planet, but these measurements are difficult and expensive to make for the majority of Kepler planet candidates. Fortunately, adopting a statistical approach helps us to ad…
Kepler-20 is a solar-type star (V = 12.5) hosting a compact system of five transiting planets, all packed within the orbital distance of Mercury in our own Solar System. A transition from rocky to gaseous planets with a planetary transition radius of ~1.6 REarth has recently been proposed by several publications in the literature (Rogers 2015;Weiss & Marcy 2014). Kepler-20b (Rp ~ 1.9 REarth) has a size beyond this transition radius, however previous mass measurements were not sufficiently precise to allow definite conclusions to be drawn regarding its composition. We present new mass measureme…
The detection of lower mass planets now being reported via radial velocity and microlensing surveys suggests that they may be ubiquitous. If missions such as Kepler are able to confirm this, the detection and study of rocky planets via direct imaging with ground-based telescopes of apertures > 20 m is feasible in the thermal infrared. We discuss two cases for detecting rocky planets, the first via detection of molten Earths formed though an Earth-Moon like impact event, and the second via detection of planets around very nearby stars. These observations have the potential to give us a first lo…
Rocky planets orbiting M-dwarf stars in the habitable zone tend to be driven to synchronous rotation by tidal dissipation, potentially causing difficulties for maintaining a habitable climate on the planet. However, the planet may be captured into asynchronous spin-orbit resonances, and this capture may be more likely if the planet has a sufficiently large intrinsic triaxial deformation. We derive the analytic expression for the maximum triaxiality of a rocky planet, with and without a liquid envelope, as a function of the planet's radius, density, rigidity and critical strain of fracture. The…
We explore the possibility that the stellar relative abundances of different species can be used to constrain the bulk abundances of known transiting rocky planets. We use high resolution spectra to derive stellar parameters and chemical abundances for Fe, Si, Mg, O, and C in three stars hosting low mass, rocky planets: CoRoT-7, Kepler-10, and Kepler-93. These planets follow the same line along the mass-radius diagram, pointing toward a similar composition. The derived abundance ratios are compared with the solar values. With a simple stoichiometric model, we estimate the iron mass fraction in…
It has been established theoretically that atmospheric thermal tides on rocky planets can lead to significant modifications of rotational evolution, both close to synchronous rotation and at faster rotations if certain resonant conditions are met. Here it is demonstrated that the normally considered dissipative gravitational tidal evolution of rocky planet rotation could, in principle, be 'stalled' by thermal tide resonances for Earth-analog worlds in the liquid water orbital zone of stars more massive than ~0.3 Msolar. The possibility of feedback effects between a planetary biosphere and the …
Motivated by recent discoveries of low-density super-Earths with short orbital periods, we have investigated in-situ accretion of H-He atmospheres on rocky bodies embedded in dissipating warm disks, by simulating quasi-static evolution of atmospheres that connect to the ambient disk. We have found that the atmospheric evolution has two distinctly different outcomes, depending on the rocky body's mass: While the atmospheres on massive rocky bodies undergo runaway disk-gas accretion, those on light rocky bodies undergo significant erosion during disk dispersal. In the atmospheric erosion, the he…
Planets with sizes between those of Earth and Neptune divide into two populations: purely rocky bodies whose atmospheres contribute negligibly to their sizes, and larger gas-enveloped planets possessing voluminous and optically thick atmospheres. We show that whether a planet forms rocky or gas-enveloped depends on the solid surface density of its parent disk. Assembly times for rocky cores are sensitive to disk solid surface density. Lower surface densities spawn smaller planetary embryos; to assemble a core of given mass, smaller embryos require more mergers between bodies farther apart and …
The Kepler Mission, combined with ground based radial velocity (RV) follow-up and dynamical analyses of transit timing variations, has revolutionized the observational constraints on sub-Neptune-size planet compositions. The results of an extensive Kepler follow-up program including multiple Doppler measurements for 22 planet-hosting stars more than doubles the population of sub-Neptune-sized transiting planets that have RV mass constraints. This unprecedentedly large and homogeneous sample of planets with both mass and radius constraints opens the possibility of a statistical study of the und…
Observed Hot Jupiters exhibit a wide range of physical properties. For a given mass, many planets have inflated radii, while others are surprisingly compact and may harbor large central cores. Motivated by the observational sample, this paper considers possible effects from collisions of smaller rocky planets with gas giant planets. In this scenario, the Jovian planets migrate first and enter into (approximately) 4 day orbits, whereas rocky planets (mass = 0.1-20 that of Earth) migrate later and then encounter the gaseous giants. Previous work indicates that the collision rates are high for su…
Rocky planets both in and outside of our solar system are observed to have a range of core-mass fractions (CMFs). Imperfect collisions can preferentially strip mantle material from a planet, changing its CMF, and are therefore thought to be the most likely cause of this observed CMF variation. However, previous work that implements these collisions into N-body simulations of planet formation has struggled to reliably form high CMF super-Earths. In this work, we specify our initial conditions and simulation parameters to maximize the prevalence of high-energy, CMF-changing collisions in order t…
The observed population of Hot Jupiters displays a stunning variety of physical properties, including a wide range of densities and core sizes for a given planetary mass. Motivated by the observational sample, this paper studies the accretion of rocky planets by Hot Jupiters, after the Jovian planets have finished their principal migration epoch and become parked in $\sim4$-day orbits. In this scenario, rocky planets form later and then migrate inward due to torques from the remaining circumstellar disk, which also damps the orbital eccentricity. This mechanism thus represents one possible cha…
Since the discovery of Kepler-10, the system has received considerable interest because it contains a small, rocky planet which orbits the star in less than a day. The system's parameters, announced by the Kepler team and subsequently used in further research, were based on only 5 months of data. We have reanalyzed this system using the full span of 29 months of Kepler photometric data, and obtained improved information about its star and the planets. A detailed asteroseismic analysis of the extended time series provides a significant improvement on the stellar parameters: Not only can we stat…
Kepler-10b was the first rocky planet detected by the Kepler satellite and con- firmed with radial velocity follow-up observations from Keck-HIRES. The mass of the planet was measured with a precision of around 30%, which was insufficient to constrain models of its internal structure and composition in detail. In addition to Kepler-10b, a second planet transiting the same star with a period of 45 days was sta- tistically validated, but the radial velocities were only good enough to set an upper limit of 20 Mearth for the mass of Kepler-10c. To improve the precision on the mass for planet b, th…
One of the most significant advances by NASA's ${\mathit Kepler}$ Mission was the discovery of an abundant new population of highly irradiated planets with sizes between the Earth and Neptune. Subsequent analysis showed that at ~1.5 Earth radii there is a transition from a population of predominantly rocky super-Earths to non-rocky sub-Neptunes, which must have substantial volatile envelopes. Determining the origin of these highly irradiated rocky planets will be critical to our understanding of low-mass planet formation and the frequency of potentially habitable Earth-like planets. These shor…
Exoplanets smaller than Neptune are common around red dwarf stars (M dwarfs), with those that transit their host star constituting the bulk of known temperate worlds amenable for atmospheric characterization. We analyze the masses and radii of all known small transiting planets around M dwarfs, identifying three populations: rocky, water-rich, and gas-rich. Our results are inconsistent with the previously known bimodal radius distribution arising from atmospheric loss of a hydrogen/helium envelope. Instead, we propose that a density gap separates rocky from water-rich exoplanets. Formation mod…
The formation of super-Earths, the most abundant planets in the Galaxy, remains elusive. These planets have masses that typically exceed that of the Earth by a factor of a few; appear to be predominantly rocky, although often surrounded by H/He atmospheres; and frequently occur in multiples. Moreover, planets that encircle the same star tend to have similar masses and radii, whereas those belonging to different systems exhibit remarkable overall diversity. Here, we advance a theoretical picture for rocky planet formation that satisfies the aforementioned constraints: building upon recent work …
Recent observations and analysis of low mass (<10$M_{\oplus}$), exoplanets have found that rocky planets only have radii up to 1.5-2$R_{\oplus}$. Two general hypotheses exist for the cause of the dichotomy between rocky and gas-enveloped planets (or possible water worlds): either low mass planets do not necessarily form thick atmospheres of a few wt. %, or the thick atmospheres on these planets easily escape driven by x-ray and extreme ultraviolet (XUV) emissions from young parent stars. Here we show that a cutoff between rocky and gas-enveloped planets due to hydrodynamic escape is most likel…
Nominally anhydrous minerals in rocky planet mantles can sequester oceans of water as a whole, giving a constraint on bulk water inventories. Here we predict mantle water capacities from the thermodynamically-limited solubility of water in their constituent minerals. We report the variability of mantle water capacity due to (i) host star refractory element abundances that set mineralogy, (ii) realistic mantle temperature scenarios, and (iii) planet mass. We find that planets large enough to stabilise perovskite almost unfailingly have a dry lower mantle, topped by a high-water-capacity transit…
The quest for atmospheric spectral signatures that may witness biological activity in exoplanets is focused on rocky planets. The best targets for future, challenging spectroscopic observations will be selected among potentially habitable planets. Surface habitability can be quantified and explored with climate and atmospheric models according to temperature-based criteria. The conceptual, modellistic, technological and interpretative complexity of the problem requires to develop flexible climate and atmospheric models suited for a comprehensive exploration of observationally unconstrained par…
We present here the detection of a system of four low-mass planets around the bright (V=5.5) and close-by (6.5 pc) star HD219134. This is the first result of the Rocky Planet Search program with HARPS-N on the TNG in La Palma. The inner planet orbits the star in 3.0937 +/-0.0004 days, on a quasi-circular orbit with a semi-major axis of 0.0382 +/- 0.0003 AU. Spitzer observations allowed us to detect the transit of the planet in front of the star making HD219134b the nearest known transiting planet to date. From the amplitude of the radial-velocity variation (2.33 +/- 0.24 m/s) and observed dept…
Context. Kepler observations have revealed a class of short period exoplanets, of which Kepler-1520 b is the prototype, which have comet-like dust tails thought to be the result of small, rocky planets losing mass. The shape and chromaticity of the transits constrain the properties of the dust particles originating from the planet's surface, offering a unique opportunity to probe the composition and geophysics of rocky exoplanets. Aims. We aim to approximate the average Kepler long-cadence light curve of Kepler-1520 b and investigate how the optical thickness and transit cross-section of a gen…
The determination of an exoplanet as rocky is critical for the assessment of planetary habitability. Observationally, the number of small-radius, transiting planets with accompanying mass measurements is insufficient for a robust determination of the transitional mass or radius. Theoretically, models predict that rocky planets can grow large enough to become gas giants when they reach ~10 Earth-masses, but the transitional mass remains unknown. Here I show how transit data, interpreted in the context of tidal theory, can reveal the critical radius that separates rocky and gaseous exoplanets. S…
The thermal evolution of rocky planets on geological timescales (Gyr) depends on the heat input from the long-lived radiogenic elements potassium, thorium, and uranium. Concentrations of the latter two in rocky planet mantles are likely to vary by up to an order of magnitude between different planetary systems because Th and U, like other heavy r-process elements, are produced by rare stellar processes. Here we discuss the effects of these variations on the thermal evolution of an Earth-size planet, using a 1D parameterized convection model. Assuming Th and U abundances consistent with geochem…
A Formation-Stage Bottleneck for Exomoons around Close-in Rocky Planets
Chengdu University of Technology（成都理工大学）；Shanghai Astronomical Observatory, Chinese Academy of Sciences（中国科学院上海天文台）；University of Zurich（苏黎世大学）；Sun Yat-sen University（中山大学）；Institute of Geochemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences（中国科学院地球化学研究所）
The interior composition of exoplanets is not observable, limiting our direct knowledge of their structure, composition, and dynamics. Recently described observational trends suggest that rocky exoplanets, that is, planets without significant volatile envelopes, are likely limited to $<$1.5 Earth radii. We show that given this likely upper limit in the radii of purely-rocky super-Earth exoplanets, the maximum expected core-mantle boundary pressure and adiabatic temperature is relatively moderate, 630 GPa and 5000 K, while the maximum central core pressure varies between 1.5 and 2.5 TPa. We fur…
Evolution and Observable Properties of Rocky Planet Atmospheres
ETH Zurich（苏黎世联邦理工学院）；Freie Universität Berlin（柏林自由大学）；National Astronomical Observatory of Japan（日本国立天文台）；Institute of Science Tokyo（东京科学大学）；NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies（美国宇航局戈达德太空研究所）；Uppsala University（乌普萨拉大学）；DLR, Institute of Space Research（德国航空航天中心空间研究所）；University of Tokyo（东京大学）；Institut des Sciences de la Terre d’Orléans,Université d’Orléans-CNRS-BRGM（奥尔良地球科学学院，奥尔良大学-法国国家科学研究中心-地质调查局）；Space Research Institute, Austrian Academy of Sciences（奥地利科学院空间研究所）
Rocky planets are common around other stars, but their atmospheric properties remain largely unconstrained. Thanks to a wealth of recent planet discoveries and upcoming advances in observing capability, we are poised to characterize the atmospheres of dozens of rocky exoplanets in this decade. Theoretical understanding of rocky exoplanet atmospheres has advanced considerably in the last few years, yielding testable predictions of their evolution, chemistry, dynamics and even possible biosignatures. Here we review key progress in this field to date and discuss future objectives. Our major concl…
Most rocky planets in the galaxy orbit a cool host star, and there is large uncertainty among theoretical models whether these planets can retain an atmosphere. The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) might be able to settle this question empirically, but most proposals for doing so require large observational effort because they are based on spectroscopy. Here we show that infrared photometry of secondary eclipses could quickly identify "candidate" atmospheres, by searching for rocky planets with atmospheres thick enough that atmospheric heat transport noticeably reduces their dayside thermal e…
Short-period exoplanets can have dayside surface temperatures surpassing 2000 K, hot enough to vaporize rock and drive a thermal wind. Small enough planets evaporate completely. We construct a radiative-hydrodynamic model of atmospheric escape from strongly irradiated, low-mass rocky planets, accounting for dust-gas energy exchange in the wind. Rocky planets with masses < 0.1 M_Earth (less than twice the mass of Mercury) and surface temperatures > 2000 K are found to disintegrate entirely in < 10 Gyr. When our model is applied to Kepler planet candidate KIC 12557548b --- which is believed to b…
Terrestrial planets, with silicate mantles and metallic cores, are likely to obtain water and carbon compounds during accretion. Here I examine the conditions that allow early formation of a surface water ocean (simultaneous with cooling to clement surface conditions), and the timeline of degassing the planetary interior into the atmosphere. The greatest fraction of a planet's initial volatile budget is degassed into the atmosphere during the end of magma ocean solidification, leaving only a small fraction of the original volatiles to be released into the atmosphere through later volcanism. Ro…
Volatile molecules containing hydrogen, carbon, and nitrogen are key components of planetary atmospheres. In the pebble accretion model for rocky planet formation, these volatile species are accreted during the main planetary formation phase. For this study, we modelled the partitioning of volatiles within a growing planet and the outgassing to the surface. The core stores more than 90\% of the hydrogen and carbon budgets of Earth for realistic values of the partition coefficients of H and C between metal and silicate melts. The magma oceans of Earth and Venus are sufficiently deep to undergo …
Magma oceans are a common result of the high degree of heating that occurs during planet formation. It is thought that almost all of the large rocky bodies in the Solar System went through at least one magma ocean phase. In this paper, we review some of the ways in which magma ocean models for the Earth, Moon, and Mars match present day observations of mantle reservoirs, internal structure, and primordial crusts, and then we present new calculations for the oxidation state of the mantle produced during the magma ocean phase. The crystallization of magma oceans likely leads to a massive mantle …
As we begin to discover rocky planets in the habitable zone of nearby stars with missions like TESS and CHEOPS, we will need quick advancements on instrumentation and observational techniques that will enable us to answer key science questions, such as What are the atmospheric characteristics of habitable zone rocky planets? How common are Earth-like biosignatures in rocky planets?} How similar or dissimilar are those planets to Earth? Over the next decade we expect to have discovered several Earth-analog candidates, but we will not have the tools to study the atmospheres of all of them in det…
HD 179070, aka Kepler-21, is a V = 8.25 F6IV star and the brightest exoplanet host discovered by Kepler. An early detailed analysis by Howell et al. (2012) of the first thirteen months (Q0 - Q5) of Kepler light curves revealed transits of a planetary companion, Kepler-21b, with a radius of about 1.60 +/- 0.04 R_earth and an orbital period of about 2.7857 days. However, they could not determine the mass of the planet from the initial radial velocity observations with Keck-HIRES, and were only able to impose a 2-sigma upper limit of 10 M_earth. Here we present results from the analysis of 82 new…
This work aims at exploring the scaling relations among rocky exoplanets. With the assumption of internal gravity increasing linearly in the core, and staying constant in the mantle, and tested against numerical simulations, a simple model is constructed, applicable to rocky exoplanets of core mass fraction (CMF) $\in 0.1\sim0.4$ and mass $\in 0.1 \sim 10 M_{\oplus}$. Various scaling relations are derived: (1) core radius fraction $\rm CRF \approx \sqrt{CMF}$, (2) Typical interior pressure $P_{\text{typical}} \sim g_{\rm{s}}^2$ (surface gravity squared), (3) core formation energy $E_{\rm diff}…
The formation of satellites is thought to be a natural by-product of planet formation in our Solar System, and thus, moons of extrasolar planets (exomoons) may be abundant in extrasolar planetary systems, as well. Exomoons have yet to be discovered. However, moons larger than 0.1 Earth masses can be detected and characterized using current transit techniques. Here, we show that collisions between rocky planets with masses between a quarter to ten Earth masses can create impact-generated debris disks that could accrete into moons. Collisions between like-sized objects, at oblique impact angles,…
The study of origins of life on Earth and the search for life on other planets are closely linked. Prebiotic chemical scenarios can help prioritize planets as targets for the search for life as we know it and can provide informative priors to help us assess the likelihood that particular spectroscopic features are evidence of life. The prerequisites for origins scenarios themselves predict spectral signatures. The interplay between origins research and the search for extraterrestrial life must start with lab work guiding exploratory ventures in the solar system, and the discoveries in the sola…
Atmospheric heat redistribution shapes the remote appearance of rocky exoplanets but there is currently no easy way to predict a planet's heat redistribution from its physical properties. This paper proposes an analytical scaling theory for the heat redistribution on tidally-locked rocky exoplanets. The main parameters of the scaling are a planet's equilibrium temperature, surface pressure, and broadband longwave optical thickness. The scaling compares favorably against idealized general circulation model simulations of TRAPPIST-1b, GJ1132b, and LHS 3844b. For these planets heat redistribution…
We use an end-to-end model of planet formation, thermodynamic evolution, and atmospheric escape to investigate how the statistical imprints of evaporation depend on the bulk composition of planetary cores (rocky vs. icy). We find that the population-wide imprints like the location of the "evaporation valley" in the distance-radius plane and the corresponding bimodal radius distribution clearly differ depending on the bulk composition of the cores. Comparison with the observed position of the valley (Fulton et al. 2017) suggests that close-in low-mass Kepler planets have a predominately Earth-l…
Detection of water vapor in the atmosphere of temperate rocky exoplanets would be a major milestone on the path towards characterization of exoplanet habitability. Past modeling work has shown that cloud formation may prevent the detection of water vapor on Earth-like planets with surface oceans using the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST). Here we analyze the potential for atmospheric detection of H2O on a different class of targets: arid planets. Using transit spectrum simulations, we show that atmospheric H2O may be easier to be detected on arid planets with cold-trapped ice deposits on the …
Several small dense exoplanets are now known, inviting comparisons to Earth and Venus. Such comparisons require translating their masses and sizes to composition models of evolved multi-layer-interior planets. Such theoretical models rely on our understanding of the Earth's interior, as well as independently derived equations of state (EOS), but have so far not involved direct extrapolations from Earth's seismic model -PREM. In order to facilitate more detailed compositional comparisons between small exoplanets and the Earth, we derive here a semi-empirical mass-radius relation for two-layer r…
Various theoretical models treating the effect of stellar irradiation on planetary envelopes predict the presence of a radius valley: i.e. a bimodal distribution of planet radii, with super-Earths and sub-Neptune planets separated by a valley at around $\approx 2~R_\oplus$. Such a valley was observed recently, owing to an improvement in the precision of stellar, and therefore planetary radii. Here we investigate the presence, location and shape of such a valley using a small sample with highly accurate stellar parameters determined from asteroseismology, which includes 117 planets with a media…
Ariel will mark the dawn of a new era as the first large-scale survey characterising exoplanetary atmospheres with science objectives to address fundamental questions about planetary composition, evolution and formation. In this study, we explore the detectability of atmospheres vaporised from magma oceans on dry, rocky Super-Earths orbiting very close to their host stars. The detection of such atmospheres would provide a definitive piece of evidence for rocky planets but are challenging measurements with currently available instruments due to their small spectral signatures. However, some of …
HD 219134 is a K-dwarf star at a distance of 6.5 parsecs around which several low-mass planets were recently discovered. The Spitzer space telescope detected a transit of the innermost of these planets, HD 219134 b, whose mass and radius (4.5 MEarth and 1.6 REarth respectively) are consistent with a rocky composition. Here, we report new highprecision time-series photometry of the star acquired with Spitzer revealing that the second innermost planet of the system, HD 219134 c, is also transiting. A global analysis of the Spitzer transit light curves and the most up-to-date HARPS-N velocity dat…
Rocky planets hosted by close-in extrasolar systems are likely to be tidally locked in 1:1 spin-orbit resonance, a configuration where they exhibit permanent dayside and nightside. Because of the resulting day-night temperature gradient, the climate and large-scale circulation of these planets are strongly determined by their atmospheric stability against collapse, which designates the runaway condensation of greenhouse gases. To better constrain the surface conditions of rocky planets located in the habitable zone of their host star, it is therefore crucial to elucidate the mechanisms that go…
