The high-energy environment and atmospheric escape of the mini-Neptune K2-18 b
Leonardo A. dos Santos, David Ehrenreich, Vincent Bourrier, Nicola Astudillo-Defru, Xavier Bonfils, François Forget, Christophe Lovis, Francesco Pepe, Stéphane Udry
备注：
5 pages, 4 figures, accepted for publication in A&A Letters, V2 with editorial corrections
K2-18 b is a transiting mini-Neptune that orbits a nearby (38 pc) cool M3 dwarf and is located inside its region of temperate irradiation. We report on the search for hydrogen escape from the atmosphere K2-18 b using Lyman-$α$ transit spectroscopy with the Space Telescope Imaging Spectrograph (STIS) instrument installed on the Hubble Space Telescope (HST). We analyzed the time-series of the fluxes of the stellar Lyman-$α$ emission of K2-18 in both its blue- and redshifted wings. We found that the average blueshifted emission of K2-18 decreases by $67\% \pm 18\%$ during the transit of the planet compared to the pre-transit emission, tentatively indicating the presence of H atoms escaping vigorously and being blown away by radiation pressure. This interpretation is not definitive because it relies on one partial transit. Based on the reconstructed Lyman-$α$ emission of K2-18, we estimate an EUV irradiation between $10^1-10^2$ erg s$^{-1}$ cm$^{-2}$ and a total escape rate in the order of $10^8$ g s$^{-1}$. The inferred escape rate suggests that the planet will lose only a small fraction (< 1%) of its mass and retain its volatile-rich atmosphere during its lifetime. More observations are needed to rule out stellar variability effects, confirm the in-transit absorption and better assess the atmospheric escape and high-energy environment of K2-18 b.
Warm Neptune- and sub-Neptune-sized exoplanets in orbits smaller than Mercury's are thought to have experienced extensive atmospheric evolution. Here we propose that a potential outcome of this atmospheric evolution is the formation of helium-dominated atmospheres. The hydrodynamic escape rates of Neptune- and sub-Neptune-sized exoplanets are comparable to the diffusion-limited escape rate of hydrogen, and therefore the escape is heavily affected by diffusive separation between hydrogen and helium. A helium atmosphere can thus be formed -- from a primordial hydrogen-helium atmosphere -- via at…
For the hot exoplanets CoRoT-24b and CoRoT-24c, observations have provided transit radii R$_{\rm T}$ of 3.7$\pm$0.4 R$_{\oplus}$ and 4.9$\pm$0.5 R$_{\oplus}$, and masses of $\le$5.7 M$_{\oplus}$ and 28$\pm$11 M$_{\oplus}$, respectively. We study their upper atmosphere structure and escape applying an hydrodynamic model. Assuming R$_{\rm T} \approx$ R$_{\rm PL}$, where R$_{\rm PL}$ is the planetary radius at the pressure of 100 mbar, we obtained for CoRoT-24b unrealistically high thermally-driven hydrodynamic escape rates. This is due to the planet's high temperature and low gravity, independen…
Characterizing the bolometric-photoevaporative transition in young sub-Neptunes with radiation-hydrodynamic simulations
Earth and Planets Laboratory, Carnegie Institution for Science（卡内基科学研究所地球与行星实验室）；Imperial Astrophysics, Department of Physics, Imperial College London（伦敦帝国理工学院物理系天文物理组）；Department of Earth, Planetary, and Space Sciences, The University of California, Los Angeles（加州大学洛杉矶分校地球、行星与空间科学系）
We use Keck/NIRSPEC to survey a sample of of young ($<$1 Gyr), short period mini Neptunes orbiting nearby K dwargs to measure their mass loss via the metastable helium line. We detect helium absorption from all four of the targets in our initial sample. The first detection, around TOI 560b, was announced in a previous paper. We now announce three additional detections around TOI 1430.01, 2076b, and TOI 1683.01. All four planets show an average in-transit excess absorption of 0.7--1.0%. However, the outflows differ in their kinematic properties. TOI 1430b exhibits pre-ingress absorption, while …
Escape of Water- and Metal-enriched Atmospheres from compact Hot mini-Neptunes with CHAIN
University of Bern（伯尔尼大学）；Space Research Institute, Austrian Academy of Sciences（奥地利科学院空间研究所）；European Space Agency (ESA), European Space Research and Technology Centre (ESTEC)（欧洲空间局（ESA）欧洲空间研究与技术中心（ESTEC））；Department of Astronomy & Astrophysics, University of Chicago（芝加哥大学天文与天体物理系）
Making use of the publicly available 1D photoionization hydrodynamics code ATES we set out to investigate the combined effects of planetary gravitational potential energy ($ϕ_p\equiv GM_p/R_p$) and stellar X-ray and Extreme Ultraviolet (XUV) irradiation ($F_{\rm XUV}$) on the evaporation efficiency ($η$) of moderately-to-highly irradiated gaseous planets, from sub-Neptunes through hot Jupiters. We show that the (known) existence of a threshold potential above which energy-limited escape (i.e., $η\simeq 1$) is unattainable can be inferred analytically. For $\log ϕ_p\gtrsim \log ϕ_p^{\rm thr}\ap…
Testing the prevalence of hydrogen-silicate miscibility in young sub-Neptunes
Institute of Astronomy, University of Cambridge（剑桥大学天文学研究所）；Department of Earth, Planetary, and Space Sciences, The University of California, Los Angeles（加州大学洛杉矶分校地球、行星与空间科学系）
We explore atmospheric escape from close-in exoplanets with the highest mass loss rates. First, we locate the transition from stellar X-ray and UV-driven escape to rapid Roche lobe overflow, which occurs once the 10-100 nbar pressure level in the atmosphere reaches the Roche lobe. Planets enter this regime when the ratio of the substellar radius to the polar radius along the visible surface pressure level, that aligns with a surface of constant Roche potential, is X/Z~$\gtrsim$~1.2 for Jovian planets (Mp~$\gtrsim$~100 M$_{\Earth}$) and X/Z~$\gtrsim$~1.02 for sub-Jovian planets ($M_p \approx$~1…
Planet atmospheric escape induced by high-energy stellar irradiation is a key phenomenon shaping the structure and evolution of planetary atmospheres. Therefore, the present-day properties of a planetary atmosphere are intimately connected with the amount of stellar flux received by a planet during its lifetime, thus with the evolutionary path of its host star. Using a recently developed analytic approximation based on hydrodynamic simulations for atmospheric escape rates, we track within a Bayesian framework the evolution of a planet as a function of stellar flux evolution history, constraine…
We obtained high-resolution infrared spectroscopy and short-cadence photometry of the 600-800 Myr Praesepe star K2-100 during transits of its 1.67-day planet. This Neptune-size object, discovered by the NASA K2 mission, is an interloper in the "desert" of planets with similar radii on short period orbits. Our observations can be used to understand its origin and evolution by constraining the orbital eccentricity by transit fitting, measuring the spin-orbit obliquity by the Rossiter-McLaughlin effect, and detecting any extended, escaping hydrogen-helium envelope with the 10830A line of neutral …
We present a uniform analysis of the atmospheric escape rate of Neptune-like planets with estimated radius and mass (restricted to $M_{\rm p}<30\,M_{\oplus}$). For each planet we compute the restricted Jeans escape parameter, $Λ$, for a hydrogen atom evaluated at the planetary mass, radius, and equilibrium temperature. Values of $Λ\lesssim20$ suggest extremely high mass-loss rates. We identify 27 planets (out of 167) that are simultaneously consistent with hydrogen-dominated atmospheres and are expected to exhibit extreme mass-loss rates. We further estimate the mass-loss rates ($L_{\rm hy}$) …
Observations have revealed in the Kepler data a depleted region separating smaller super-Earths from larger sub-Neptunes. This can be explained as an evaporation valley between planets with and without H/He that is caused by atmospheric escape. First, we conduct numerical simulations of the evolution of close-in low-mass planets with H/He undergoing escape. Second, we develop an analytical model for the valley locus. We find that the bottom of the valley quantified by the radius of the largest stripped core $R_{\rm b}$ at a given orbital distance depends only weakly on post-formation H/He mass…
Short-period sub-Neptunes with substantial volatile envelopes are among the most common type of known exoplanets. However, recent studies of the Kepler population have suggested a dearth of sub-Neptunes on highly irradiated orbits, where they are vulnerable to atmospheric photoevaporation. Physically, we expect this "photoevaporation desert" to depend on the total lifetime X-ray and extreme ultraviolet flux, the main drivers of atmospheric escape. In this work, we study the demographics of sub-Neptunes as a function of lifetime exposure to high energy radiation and host star mass. We find that…
We show that photoevaporation of small gaseous exoplanets ("mini-Neptunes") in the habitable zones of M dwarfs can remove several Earth masses of hydrogen and helium from these planets and transform them into potentially habitable worlds. We couple X-ray/extreme ultraviolet (XUV)-driven escape, thermal evolution, tidal evolution and orbital migration to explore the types of systems that may harbor such "habitable evaporated cores" (HECs). We find that HECs are most likely to form from planets with $\sim 1 M_\oplus$ solid cores with up to about 50% H/He by mass, though whether or not a given mi…
Mini-Neptunes seem to be common planets. In this work we investigate the possible formation histories and predicted occurrence rates of mini-Neptunes assuming the planets form beyond the iceline. We consider pebble and planetesimal accretion accounting for envelope enrichment and two different opacity conditions. We find that the formation of mini-Neptunes is a relatively frequent output when envelope enrichment by volatiles is included, and that there is a "sweet spot" for mini-Neptune formation with a relatively low solid accretion rate of ~10^{-6} Earth masses per year. This rate is typical…
Since planet occurrence and primordial atmospheric retention probability increase with period, the occurrence-weighted median planets discovered by transit surveys may bear little resemblance to the low-occurrence, short-period planets sculpted by atmospheric escape ordinarily used to calibrate mass--radius relations and planet formation models. An occurrence-weighted mass--radius relation for the low-mass planets discovered so far by transit surveys orbiting solar-type stars requires both occurrence-weighted median Earth-mass and Neptune-mass planets to have a few percent of their masses in h…
Using observations of escaping H/He to constrain the atmospheric composition of sub-Neptunes
Institute of Astronomy, University of Cambridge（剑桥大学天体物理研究所）；Astrophysics Group, Department of Physics, Imperial College London（帝国理工学院物理系天体物理组）；Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics, University of California, Santa Cruz（加州大学圣克鲁斯分校天文与天体物理系）
In the presence of a magnetic field and weakly ionizing winds, ohmic dissipation is expected to take place in the envelopes of Jovian and lower-mass planets alike. While the process has been investigated on the former, there have been no studies done on mini-Neptunes so far. From structure and thermal evolution models, we determine that the required energy deposition for halting the contraction of mini-Neptunes increases with planetary mass and envelope fraction. Scaled to the insolation power, the ohmic heating needed is small $\sim10^{-5}$ -- orders of magnitude lower than for exo-Jupiters $…
Atmospheric observations of mini-Neptunes orbiting M-dwarfs are beginning to provide constraints on their chemical and thermal properties, while also providing clues about their interiors and potential surfaces. With their relatively large scale heights and large planet-star contrasts, mini-Neptunes are currently ideal targets towards the goal of characterising temperate low-mass exoplanets. Understanding the thermal structures and spectral appearances of mini-Neptunes is important to understand various aspects of their atmospheres, including radiative/convective energy transport, boundary con…
The helium absorption triplet at a wavelength of 10,833 Å has been proposed as a way to probe the escaping atmospheres of exoplanets. Recently this feature was detected for the first time using Hubble Space Telescope (HST) WFC3 observations of the hot Jupiter WASP-107b. We use similar HST/WFC3 observations to detect helium in the atmosphere of the hot Neptune HAT-P-11b at the $4σ$ confidence level. We compare our observations to a grid of 1D models of hydrodynamic escape to constrain the thermospheric temperatures and mass loss rate. We find that our data are best fit by models with high mass …
Exoplanets with substantial Hydrogen/Helium atmospheres have been discovered in abundance, many residing extremely close to their parent stars. The extreme irradiation levels these atmospheres experience causes them to undergo hydrodynamic atmospheric escape. Ongoing atmospheric escape has been observed to be occurring in a few nearby exoplanet systems through transit spectroscopy both for hot Jupiters and lower-mass super-Earths/mini-Neptunes. Detailed hydrodynamic calculations that incorporate radiative transfer and ionization chemistry are now common in one-dimensional models, and multi-dim…
Planetary atmospheric escape and disk formation around WDJ0914+1914
Instituto de Astronomía Teórica y Experimental (CONICET-UNC)（理论与实验天体物理研究所）；Instituto de Astrofísica de La Plata, CCT La Plata-CONICET-UNLP（拉普拉塔天体物理研究所）；Departamento de Física, Universidad Técnica Federico Santa María（圣马利亚技术大学物理系）；Instituto de Ciencias Nucleares, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México（墨西哥国立自治大学核科学研究所）；Department of Physics, University of Warwick（华威大学物理系）
In the present chapter we present the results of evolutionary studies of exoplanetary atmospheres. We mostly focus on the sub- to super-Earth domain, although these methods are applicable to all types of exoplanets. We consider both thermal and nonthermal loss processes. The type of thermal loss mechanism depends on so-called escape parameter $β$, which is the ratio of the gravitational energy of a particle to its thermal energy. While $β$ is decreasing, an exoplanet switches from classical Jeans to modified Jeans and finally to blow-off escape mechanisms. During blow-off the majority of the a…
We detect Lyman $α$ absorption from the escaping atmosphere of HD 63433c, a $R=2.67 R_\oplus$, $P=20.5$ d mini Neptune orbiting a young (440 Myr) solar analogue in the Ursa Major Moving Group. Using HST/STIS, we measure a transit depth of $11.1 \pm 1.5$% in the blue wing and $8 \pm 3$% in the red. This signal is unlikely to be due to stellar variability, but should be confirmed by an upcoming second visit with HST. We do not detect Lyman $α$ absorption from the inner planet, a smaller $R=2.15 R_\oplus$ mini Neptune on a 7.1 d orbit. We use Keck/NIRSPEC to place an upper limit of 0.5% on helium…
We obtained spectra of the pre-main sequence star AU Microscopii during a transit of its Neptune-sized planet to investigate its orbit and atmosphere. We used the high-dispersion near-infrared spectrograph IRD on the Subaru telescope to detect the Doppler "shadow" from the planet and constrain the projected stellar obliquity. Modeling of the observed planetary Doppler shadow suggests a spin-orbit alignment of the system ($λ=-4.7_{-6.4}^{+6.8}$ degrees), but additional observations are needed to confirm this finding. We use both the IRD data and spectra obtained with NIRSPEC on Keck-II to searc…
We report the discovery of a warm Neptune and a hot sub-Neptune transiting TOI-421 (BD-14 1137, TIC 94986319), a bright (V=9.9) G9 dwarf star in a visual binary system observed by the TESS space mission in Sectors 5 and 6. We performed ground-based follow-up observations -- comprised of LCOGT transit photometry, NIRC2 adaptive optics imaging, and FIES, CORALIE, HARPS, HIRES, and PFS high-precision Doppler measurements -- and confirmed the planetary nature of the 16-day transiting candidate announced by the TESS team. We discovered an additional radial velocity signal with a period of 5 days in…
$π$ Men c was recently announced as the first confirmed exoplanet from the TESS mission. The planet has a radius of just 2 R$_{\rm\oplus}$ and it transits a nearby Sun-like star of naked-eye brightness, making it the ideal target for atmospheric characterisation of a super-Earth. Here we analyse archival $\textit{ROSAT}$ and $\textit{Swift}$ observations of $π$ Men in order to determine the X-ray and extreme-ultraviolet irradiation of the planetary atmosphere and assess whether atmospheric escape is likely to be on-going. We find that $π$ Men has a similar level of X-ray emission to the Sun, w…
The TESS mission has enabled discoveries of the brightest transiting planet systems around young stars. These systems are the benchmarks for testing theories of planetary evolution. We report the discovery of a mini-Neptune transiting a bright star in the AB Doradus moving group. HIP 94235 (TOI-4399, TIC 464646604) is a Vmag=8.31 G-dwarf hosting a 3.00 -0.28/+0.32 Rearth mini-Neptune in a 7.7 day period orbit. HIP 94235 is part of the AB Doradus moving group, one of the youngest and closest associations. Due to its youth, the host star exhibits significant photometric spot modulation, lithium …
GJ 3470b is a warm Neptune transiting an M-dwarf star at the edge of the evaporation desert. It offers the possibility of investigating how low-mass, close-in exoplanets evolve under the irradiation from their host stars. We observed three transits of GJ 3470b in the Lyman-alpha line with the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) as part of the Panchromatic Comparative Exoplanet Treasury (PanCET) program. Absorption signatures are detected with similar properties in all three independent epochs, with absorption depths of 35+-7% in the blue wing of the line, and 23+-5% in the red wing. The repeatability…
The upcoming James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) promises a generational shift in the study of temperate mini-Neptune atmospheres using transit spectroscopy. High-altitude clouds however threaten to impede their atmospheric characterisation by muting spectral features. In this study, we systematically investigate JWST instrument configurations for characterising cloudy mini-Neptune atmospheres, assessing the importance of instrument choice and wavelength coverage, focusing on NIRISS and NIRSpec. We consider two temperate mini-Neptunes orbiting nearby M dwarfs, K2-18 b and TOI-732 c, with equilib…
Super-Earths and mini-Neptunes are the most abundant types of planets among the ~3500 confirmed exoplanets, and are expected to exhibit a wide variety of atmospheric compositions. Recent transmission spectra of super-Earths and mini-Neptunes have demonstrated the possibility that exoplanets have haze/cloud layers at high altitudes in their atmospheres. However, the compositions, size distributions, and optical properties of these particles in exoplanet atmospheres are poorly understood. Here, we present the results of experimental laboratory investigations of photochemical haze formation withi…
Stellar heating causes atmospheres of close-in exoplanets to expand and escape. These extended atmospheres are difficult to observe because their main spectral signature - neutral hydrogen at ultraviolet wavelengths - is strongly absorbed by interstellar medium. We report the detection of the near-infrared triplet of neutral helium in the transiting warm Neptune-mass exoplanet HAT-P-11b using ground-based, high-resolution observations. The helium feature is repeatable over two independent transits, with an average absorption depth of 1.08+/-0.05%. Interpreting absorption spectra with 3D simula…
We calculated an atmospheric grid for hot mini-Neptune and giant exoplanets, that links astrophysical observable parameters- orbital distance and stellar type- with the chemical atmospheric species expected. The grid can be applied to current and future observations to characterize exoplanet atmospheres and serves as a reference to interpret atmospheric retrieval analysis results. To build the grid, we developed a 1D code for calculating the atmospheric thermal structure and link it to a photochemical model that includes disequilibrium chemistry (molecular diffusion, vertical mixing and photoc…
The increasing number of super-Earths close to their host stars revealed a scarcity of close-in small planets with 1.5-2.0$\,R_\oplus$ in the radius distribution of ${\it Kepler}$ planets. The atmospheric escape of super-Earths by photoevaporation can explain the origin of the observed "radius gap." Many theoretical studies considered the in-situ mass loss of a close-in planet. Planets that undergo the atmospheric escape, however, move outward due to the change in the orbital angular momentum of their star-planet systems. In this study, we calculate the orbital evolution of an evaporating supe…
Young stars are mostly found in dense stellar environments, and even our own Solar system may have formed in a star cluster. Here, we numerically explore the evolution of planetary systems similar to our own Solar system in star clusters. We investigate the evolution of planetary systems in star clusters. Most stellar encounters are tidal, hyperbolic, and adiabatic. A small fraction of the planetary systems escape from the star cluster within 50 Myr; those with low escape speeds often remain intact during and after the escape process. While most planetary systems inside the star cluster remain…
Exploring the ultrahot Neptune LTT 9779 b with CRIRES+. Non-detection of helium transmission spectra and detection of H$_2$O on the dayside
University of Science and Technology of China（中国科学技术大学）；Georg-August-Universität Göttingen（哥廷根大学）；Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München（慕尼黑大学）；Leibniz-Institut für Astrophysik Potsdam (AIP)（波茨坦阿诺德·爱因斯坦天文研究所）；Instituto de Astrofísica de Andalucía (IAA-CSIC)（安达卢西亚天体物理学研究所）；Uppsala universitet（乌普萨拉大学）；Thüringer Landessternwarte Tautenburg（图林根州立陶滕堡天文台）
利用 CRIRES+ 对超热海王星 LTT 9779 b 进行凌星和白天侧光谱观测，未探测到氦吸收（上限 0.45%），但探测到 H2O 信号（4.8σ），联合反演表明低水丰度且无热反转，旋转速度与同步自转一致。
Recent observations by the {\it Kepler} space telescope have led to the discovery of more than 4000 exoplanet candidates consisting of many systems with Earth- to Neptune-sized objects that reside well inside the orbit of Mercury, around their respective host stars. How and where these close-in planets formed is one of the major unanswered questions in planet formation. Here we calculate the required disk masses for {\it in situ} formation of the {\it Kepler} planets. We find that, if close-in planets formed as {\it isolation masses}, then standard gas-to-dust ratios yield corresponding gas di…
Some super Earths and mini Neptunes will likely have thick atmospheres that are not H2-dominated. We have developed a photochemistry-thermochemistry kinetic-transport model for exploring the compositions of thick atmospheres on super Earths and mini Neptunes, applicable for both H2-dominated atmospheres and non-H2-dominated atmospheres. Using this model to study thick atmospheres for wide ranges of temperatures and elemental abundances, we classify them into hydrogen-rich atmospheres, water-rich atmospheres, oxygen-rich atmospheres, and hydrocarbon-rich atmospheres. We find that carbon has to …
Comparisons of the alignment of exoplanets with a common host star can be used to distinguish among concurrent evolution scenarios. However, multi-planet systems usually host mini-Neptunes and super-Earths, whose size make orbital architecture measurements challenging. We introduce the Rossiter-McLaughlin effect Revolutions technique, which can access spin-orbit angles of small planets by exploiting the full information contained in spectral transit time series. We validated the technique on published HARPS-N data of the mini-Neptune HD3167c, refining its high sky-projected spin-orbit angle (-…
Mini-Neptunes orbiting M stars are a growing population of known exoplanets. Some of them are located very close to their host star, receiving large amounts of UV radiation. Many M stars emit strong chromospheric emission in the H I Lyman $α$ line (Ly$α$) at 1215.67 Å, the brightest far-UV emission line. We show that the effect of incoming Ly$α$ flux can significantly change the photochemistry of mini-Neptunes' atmospheres. We use GJ 436b as an example, considering different metallicities for its atmospheric composition. For solar composition, H$_2$O-mixing ratios show the largest change becau…
Numerous solar system atmospheres possess aerosols including the characteristic organic hazes of Titan and Pluto. Haze particles substantially impact atmospheric temperatures structures and may provide organic material to the surface of a world, thereby affecting its habitability. Observations of exoplanet atmospheres suggest the presence of aerosols, especially in cooler (<800 K), smaller (<0.3 times Jupiter's mass) exoplanets. It remains unclear if the aerosols muting the spectroscopic features of exoplanet atmospheres are condensate clouds or photochemical hazes, which is difficult to predi…
