Planet-planet scattering best explains the eccentricity distribution of extrasolar giant planets. Past literature showed that the orbits of planets evolve due to planet-planet scattering. This work studies the spin evolution of planets in planet-planet scattering in 2-planet systems. Spin can evolve dramatically due to spin-orbit coupling made possible by the evolving spin and orbital precession during the planet-planet scattering phase. The main source of torque to planet spin is the stellar torque, and the total planet-plane torque contribution is negligible. As a consequence of the evolution of the spin, planets can end up with significant obliquity (the angle between a planet's own orbit normal and spin axis) like planets in our Solar System.
Extrasolar planetary host stars are enriched in key planet-building elements. These enrichments have the potential to drastically alter the building blocks available for terrestrial planet formation. Here we report on the combination of dynamical models of late-stage terrestrial planet formation within known extrasolar planetary systems with chemical equilibrium models of the composition of solid material within the disk. This allows us to constrain the bulk elemental composition of extrasolar terrestrial planets. A wide variety of resulting planetary compositions exist, ranging from those tha…
Extrasolar planet host stars have been found to be enriched in key planet-building elements. These enrichments have the potential to drastically alter the composition of material available for terrestrial planet formation. Here we report on the combination of dynamical models of late-stage terrestrial planet formation within known extrasolar planetary systems with chemical equilibrium models of the composition of solid material within the disk. This allows us to determine the bulk elemental composition of simulated extrasolar terrestrial planets. A wide variety of resulting planetary compositi…
Using Keck/HIRES, we report abundances of 11 different elements heavier than helium in the spectrum of Ton 345, a white dwarf that has accreted one of its own minor planets. This particular extrasolar planetesimal which was at least 60% as massive as Vesta appears to have been carbon-rich and water-poor; we suggest it was compositionally similar to those Kuiper Belt Objects with relatively little ice.
Chemical kinetics plays an important role in controlling the atmospheric composition of all planetary atmospheres, including those of extrasolar planets. For the hottest exoplanets, the composition can closely follow thermochemical-equilibrium predictions, at least in the visible and infrared photosphere at dayside (eclipse) conditions. However, for atmospheric temperatures < ~2000 K, and in the uppermost atmosphere at any temperature, chemical kinetics matters. The two key mechanisms by which kinetic processes drive an exoplanet atmosphere out of equilibrium are photochemistry and transport-i…
The magnetospheric emissions from extrasolar planets represent a science frontier for the next decade. All of the solar system giant planets and the Earth produce radio emissions as a result of interactions between their magnetic fields and the solar wind. In the case of the Earth, its magnetic field may contribute to its habitability by protecting its atmosphere from solar wind erosion and by preventing energetic particles from reaching its surface. Indirect evidence for at least some extrasolar giant planets also having magnetic fields includes the modulation of emission lines of their host …
We report here that the equation for H2O Rayleigh scattering was incorrectly stated in the original paper [arXiv:1009.5814]. Instead of a quadratic dependence on refractivity r, we accidentally quoted an r^4 dependence. Since the correct form of the equation was implemented into the model, scientific results are not affected.
Transit and radial velocity surveys have deeply explored the population of extrasolar giant planets, with hundreds of objects detected to date. All these detections allow to understand their physical properties and to constrain their formation, migration, and evolution mechanism. In this chapter, the observed properties of these planets are presented along with the various populations identified in the data. The occurrence rates of giant exoplanets, as observed in different stellar environment by various surveys are also reviewed and compared. Finally, the presence and properties of the giant …
We investigate modons on tidally synchronised extrasolar planets. Modons are highly dynamic, coherent flow structures composed of a pair of storms with opposite signs of vorticity. They are important because they divert flows on the large-scale; and, powered by the intense irradiation from the host star, they are planetary-scale sized and exhibit quasi-periodic life-cycles -- chaotically moving around the planet, breaking and reforming many times over long durations (e.g. thousands of planet days). Additionally, modons transport and mix planetary-scale patches of hot and cold air around the pl…
We study the impact of multi-layered clouds (low-level water and high-level ice clouds) on the thermal emission spectra of Earth-like planets orbiting different types of stars. Clouds have an important influence on such planetary emission spectra due to their wavelength dependent absorption and scattering properties. We also investigate the influence of clouds on the ability to derive information about planetary surface temperatures from low-resolution spectra.
Over 300 extrasolar planets have been found since 1992, showing that planetary systems are common and exhibit an outstanding variety of characteristics. As the number of detections grows and as models of planet formation progress to account for the existence of these new worlds, statistical studies and confrontations of observation with theory allow to progressively unravel the key processes underlying planet formation. In this chapter we review the dominant contribution of Doppler spectroscopy to the present discoveries and to our general understanding of planetary systems. We also emphasize …
The magnetization of solar and extrasolar gas giants is critically dependent on electronic and mass transport coefficients of their convective fluid interiors. We analyze recent laboratory experimental results on metallic hydrogen to derive a new conductivity profile for the Jovian-like planets. We combine this revised conductivity with a polytropic-based thermodynamic equation of state to study the dynamo action in 100 extrasolar giant planets varying from synchronous hot jupiters to fast rotators, with masses ranging from 0.3MJ to 15MJ. We find conducting cores larger than previous estimates…
Observational surveys for extrasolar planets probe the diverse outcomes of planet formation and evolution. These surveys measure the frequency of planets with different masses, sizes, orbital characteristics, and host star properties. Small planets between the sizes of Earth and Neptune substantially outnumber Jupiter-sized planets. The survey measurements support the core accretion model in which planets form by the accumulation of solids and then gas in protoplanetary disks. The diversity of exoplanetary characteristics demonstrates that most of the gross features of the Solar system are one…
We study the effects of gravity waves, or g-modes, on hot extrasolar planets. These planets are expected to possess stably-stratified atmospheres, which support gravity waves. In this paper, we review the derivation of the equation that governs the linear dynamics of gravity waves and describe its application to a hot extrasolar planet, using HD209458 b as a generic example. We find that gravity waves can exhibit a wide range of behaviors, even for a single atmospheric profile. The waves can significantly accelerate or decelerate the background mean flow, depending on the difference between th…
Brown Dwarf and extrasolar planet atmospheres form clouds which strongly influence the local chemistry and physics. These clouds are globally neutral obeying dust-gas charge equilibrium which is, on short time scales, inconsistent with the observation of stochastic ionisation events of the solar system planets. We argue that a significant volume of the clouds in Brown Dwarfs and extrasolar planets is susceptible to local discharge events. These are electron avalanches triggered by charged dust grains. Such intra-cloud discharges occur on time scales shorter than the time needed to neutralise t…
A new theoretical hypothesis on the origin and formation of the solar and extrasolar planetary systems is summarized and briefly discussed in the light of recent detections of extrasolar planets, and studies of shock wave interaction with molecular clouds, as well as H. Alfven's work on Sun's magnetic field and its effect on the formation of the solar system (1962). We propose that all objects in a planetary system originate from a small group of dense fragments in a giant molecular cloud (GMC). The mechanism of one or more shock waves, which propagate through the protoplanetary disk during th…
This article presents a review on the observations and theoretical modeling of the evaporation of extrasolar planets. The observations and the resulting constraints on the upper atmosphere (thermosphere and exosphere) of the "hot-Jupiters". are described. The early observations of the first discovered transiting extrasolar planet, HD209458b, allowed the discovery that this planet has an extended atmosphere of escaping hydrogen. Subsequent observations showed the presence of oxygen and carbon at very high altitude. These observations give unique constraints on the escape rate and mechanism in t…
Planetary satellites are an integral part of the heirarchy of planetary systems. Here we make two predictions concerning their formation. First, primordial satellites, which have an array of distinguishing characteristics, form only around giant planets. If true, the size and duration of a planetary system's protostellar nebula, as well as the location of its snow line, can be constrained by knowing which of its planets possess primordial satellites and which do not. Second, all satellites around terrestrial planets form by impacts. If true, this greatly enhances the constraints that can be pl…
The gravitational influence of a planet on a nearby disk provides a powerful tool for detecting and studying extrasolar planetary systems. Here we demonstrate that gaps can be opened in dynamically cold debris disks at the mean-motion resonances of an orbiting planet. The gaps are opened away from the orbit of the planet itself, revealing that not all disk gaps need contain a planetary body. These gaps are large and deep enough to be detectable in resolved disk images for a wide range of reasonable disk-planet parameters, though we are not aware of any such gaps detected to date. The gap shape…
Polarimetry of extrasolar planets becomes a new tool for their investigation, which requires the development of diagnostic techniques and parameter case studies. Our goal is to develop a theoretical model which can be applied to interpret polarimetric observations of extrasolar planets. Here we present a theoretical parameter study that shows the influence of the various involved parameters on the polarization curves. Furthermore, we investigate the robustness of the fitting procedure. We employ the physics of Rayleigh scattering to obtain polarization curves of an unresolved extrasolar planet…
In these proceedings we give a status update of the Calan-Hertfordshire Extrasolar Planet Search, an international collaboration led from Chile that aims to discover more planets around super metal-rich and Sun-like stars, and then follow these up with precision photometry to hunt for new bright transit planets. We highlight some results from this program, including exoplanet and brown dwarf discoveries, and a possible correlation between metallicity and planetary minimum mass at the lowest planetary masses detectable. Finally we discuss the short-term and long-term future pathways this progra…
Prior work has found that a variety of terrestrial planetary compositions are expected to occur within known extrasolar planetary systems. However, such studies ignored the effects of giant planet migration, which is thought to be very common in extra-solar systems. Here we present calculations of the compositions of terrestrial planets that formed in dynamical simulations incorporating varying degrees of giant planet migration. We used chemical equilibrium models of the solid material present in the disks of five known planetary host stars: the Sun, GJ 777, HD4203, HD19994 and HD213240. Giant…
We present new transit observations of the transiting exoplanet TrES-3b obtained in the range 2009 -- 2011 at several observatories. The orbital parameters of the system were redetermined and the new linear ephemeris was calculated. We performed numerical simulations for studying the long-term stability of orbits.
The effects of multi-layered clouds in the atmospheres of Earth-like planets orbiting different types of stars are studied. The radiative effects of cloud particles are directly correlated with their wavelength-dependent optical properties. Therefore the incident stellar spectra may play an important role for the climatic effect of clouds. We discuss the influence of clouds with mean properties measured in the Earth's atmosphere on the surface temperatures and Bond albedos of Earth-like planets orbiting different types of main sequence dwarf stars.
We discuss the nature of rings that may exist around extrasolar planets. Taking the general properties of rings around the gas giants in the Solar System, we infer the likely properties of rings around exoplanets that reside inside the ice line. Due to their proximity to their host star, rings around such exoplanets must primarily consist of rocky materials. However, we find that despite the higher densities of rock compared to ice, most of the observed extrasolar planets with reliable radii measurements have sufficiently large Roche radii to support rings. For the currently known transiting e…
Several processes can cause the shape of an extrasolar giant planet's shadow, as viewed in transit, to depart from circular. In addition to rotational effects, cloud formation, non-homogenous haze production and movement, and dynamical effects (winds) could also be important. When such a planet transits its host star as seen from Earth, the asphericity will introduce a deviation in the transit lightcurve relative to the transit of a perfectly spherical (or perfectly oblate) planet. We develop a theoretical framework to interpret planet shapes. We then generate predictions for transiting planet…
Stellar radial velocity (RV) measurements have proven to be a very successful method for detecting extrasolar planets. Analysing RV data to determine the parameters of the extrasolar planets is a significant statistical challenge owing to the presence of multiple planets and various degeneracies between orbital parameters. Determining the number of planets favoured by the observed data is an even more difficult task. Bayesian model selection provides a mathematically rigorous solution to this problem by calculating marginal posterior probabilities of models with different number of planets, bu…
We expand on the results of Nielsen et al. (2008), using the null result for giant extrasolar planets around the 118 target stars from the VLT NACO H and Ks band planet search (Masciadri et al. 2005), the VLT and MMT Simultaneous Differential Imaging (SDI) survey (Biller et al. 2007), and the Gemini Deep Planet Survey (Lafreniere et al. 2007) to set constraints on the population of giant extrasolar planets. Our analysis is extended to include the planet luminosity models of Fortney et al. (2008), as well as the correlation between stellar mass and frequency of giant planets found by Johnson et…
We present a new empirical calibration of equilibrium tidal theory for extrasolar planet systems, extending a prior study by incorporating detailed physical models for the internal structure of planets and host stars. The resulting strength of the stellar tide produces a coupling that is strong enough to reorient the spins of some host stars without causing catastrophic orbital evolution, thereby potentially explaining the observed trend in alignment between stellar spin and planetary orbital angular momentum. By isolating the sample whose spins should not have been altered in this model, we a…
Previous studies have shown that extrasolar Earth-like planets in close-in habitable zones around M-stars are weakly protected against galactic cosmic rays (GCRs), leading to a strongly increased particle flux to the top of the planetary atmosphere. Two main effects were held responsible for the weak shielding of such an exoplanet: (a) For a close-in planet, the planetary magnetic moment is strongly reduced by tidal locking. Therefore, such a close-in extrasolar planet is not protected by an extended magnetosphere. (b) The small orbital distance of the planet exposes it to a much denser stella…
The detection of hot atomic hydrogen and heavy atoms and ions at high altitudes around close-in extrasolar giant planets (EGPs) such as HD209458b imply that these planets have hot and rapidly escaping atmospheres that extend to several planetary radii. These characteristics, however, cannot be generalized to all close-in EGPs. The thermal escape mechanism and mass loss rate from EGPs depend on a complex interplay between photochemistry and radiative transfer driven by the stellar UV radiation. In this work we explore how these processes change under different levels of irradiation on giant pla…
We propose a method to be able to decide whether the planets of CoRoT-7 are moving on mutually inclined orbits in the order of i > 10 degrees. The extrasolar system CoRoT-7 is very special with respect to the closeness of the planets to the host star, which results in a fast dynamical development. It would therefore be possible to determine the inclination of the innermost planet CoRoT-7b with respect to the observer after an observation of at least three years from space with the satellite CoRoT with sufficient precision. Different inclinations would cause different duration of the transit ti…
Context. The mass and radius of a planet directly provide its bulk density, which can be interpreted in terms of its overall composition. Any measure of the radial mass distribution provides a first step in constraining the interior structure. The fluid Love number $k_2$ provides such a measure, and estimates of $k_2$ for extrasolar planets are expected to be available in the coming years thanks to improved observational facilities and the ever-extending temporal baseline of extrasolar planet observations. Aims. We derive a method for calculating the Love numbers $k_n$ of any object given its …
The TAU code is a 1D line-by-line radiative transfer code, which is generally applicable for modelling transmission spectra of close-in extrasolar planets. The inputs are the assumed pressure-temperature profile of the planetary atmosphere, the continuum absorption coefficients and the absorption cross-sections for the trace molecular absorbers present in the model, as well as the fundamental system parameters taken from the published literature. The program then calculates the optical path through the planetary atmosphere of the radiation from the host star, and quantifies the absorption due …
We present a second paper of fully characterization of a sample of stars whose low-depth transits were discovered by the OGLE-III campaign in order to select the most promising candidates for spectroscopic confirmation, following the same analysis done in Gallardo et al. (2005). We present new optical and near-IR photometry, deriving physical parameters like effective temperature (Teff), distance (d), the stellar radii (R*) and the companion radii (Rc). We selected eight M (2800 K \le Teff \le 3850 K) or K (3850 K \le Teff \le 5150 K) spectral type stellar objects as potential candidates to ho…
Hot Jupiters are a class of extrasolar planet that orbit their parent stars at very short distances. Due to their close proximity, they are expected to be tidally locked, which can lead to a large temperature difference between their day and nightsides. Infrared observations of eclipsing systems have yielded dayside temperatures for a number of transiting planets. Furthermore the day-night contrast of the transiting extrasolar planet HD 189733b was mapped using infrared observations. It is expected that the contrast between the dayside and nightside of hot Jupiters is much higher at visual wav…
M type stars are good targets in the search for habitable extrasolar planets. Because of their low effective temperatures, the habitable zone of M stars is very close to the star itself. For planets close to their stars, tidal heating plays an important role in thermal and orbital evolutions, especially when the planet orbit has a relatively large eccentricity. Although tidal heating interacts with the thermal state and orbit of the planet, such coupled calculations for extrasolar planets around M star have not been conducted. We perform coupled calculations using simple structural and orbital…
I give a summary of the HSTEP project: an effort to calculate the physical properties of the known transiting extrasolar planets using a homogeneous approach. I discuss the motivation for the project, list the 83 planets which have already been studied, run through some important aspects of the methodology, and finish with a synopsis of the results. The results have been compiled into an online catalogue: TEPCat.
The field of extrasolar planets is still, in comparison with other astrophysical topics, in its infancy. There have been about 300 or so extrasolar planets detected and their detection has been accomplished by various different techniques. Here we present a simple laboratory experiment to show how planets are detected using the transit technique. Following the simple analysis procedure describe we are able to determine the planetary radius to be 1.27 +/- 0.20 R_{J} which, within errors agrees with the establish value of 1.32 +/- 0.25 R_{J}.
The existence of water in extrasolar planetary systems is of great interest as it constrains the potential for habitable planets and life. Here, we report the identification of a circumstellar disk that resulted from the destruction of a water-rich and rocky, extrasolar minor planet. The parent body formed and evolved around a star somewhat more massive than the Sun, and the debris now closely orbits the white dwarf remnant of the star. The stellar atmosphere is polluted with metals accreted from the disk, including oxygen in excess of that expected for oxide minerals, indicating the parent bo…
The study of transiting extrasolar planets is only 15 years old, but has matured into a rich area of research. I review the observational aspects of this work, concentrating on the discovery of transits, the characterisation of planets from photometry and spectroscopy, the Homogeneous Studies project, starspots, orbital obliquities, and the atmospheric properties of the known planets. I begin with historical context and conclude with a glance to a future of TESS, CHEOPS, Gaia and PLATO.
Within the next few years, several instruments aiming at imaging extrasolar planets will see first light. In parallel, low mass planets are being searched around red dwarfs which offer more favorable conditions, both for radial velocity detection and transit studies, than solar-type stars. We review recent advancements in modeling the stellar to substellar transition. The revised solar oxygen abundances and cloud models allow to reproduce the photometric and spectroscopic properties of this transition to a degree never achieved before, but problems remain in the important M-L transition charac…
Jupiter's radio emission has been linked to its planetary-scale magnetic field, and spacecraft investigations have revealed that most planets, and some moons, have or had a global magnetic field. Generated by internal dynamos, magnetic fields are one of the few remote sensing means of constraining the properties of planetary interiors. For the Earth, its magnetic field has been speculated to be partially responsible for its habitability, and knowledge of an extrasolar planet's magnetic field may be necessary to assess its habitability. The radio emission from Jupiter and other solar system pla…
We analyzed the behavior of the rotational velocity in the parent stars of extrasolar planets. Projected rotational velocity v sin i and angular momentum were combined with stellar and planetary parameters, for a unique sample of 147 stars, amounting to 184 extrasolar planets, including 25 multiple systems. Indeed, for the present working sample we considered only stars with planets detected by the radial-velocity procedure. Our analysis shows that the v sin i distribution of stars with planets along the HR Diagram follows the well established scenario for the rotation of intermediate to low m…
In this paper we discuss how we can read a planets spectrum to assess its habitability and search for the signatures of a biosphere. After a decade rich in giant exoplanet detections, observation techniques have now reached the ability to find planets of less than 10 MEarth (so called Super-Earths) that may potentially be habitable. How can we characterize those planets and assess if they are habitable? The new field of extrasolar planet search has shown an extraordinary ability to combine research by astrophysics, chemistry, biology and geophysics into a new and exciting interdisciplinary app…
We report a stellar flare occurring during a transit of the exoplanet OGLE-TR-10b, an event not previously reported in the literature. This reduces the observed transit depth, particularly in the u'-band, but flaring could also be significant in other bands and could lead to incorrect planetary parameters. We suggest that OGLE-TR-10a is an active planet-hosting star and has an unusually high X-ray luminosity.
We provide an 'effective theory' of tidal dissipation in extrasolar planet systems by empirically calibrating a model for the equilibrium tide. The model is valid to high order in eccentricity and parameterised by two constants of bulk dissipation - one for dissipation in the planet and one for dissipation in the host star. We are able to consistently describe the distribution of extrasolar planetary systems in terms of period, eccentricity and mass (with a lower limit of a Saturn mass) with this simple model. Our model is consistent with the survival of short-period exoplanet systems, but not…
Continuing work initiated in an earlier publication [Sato and Asada, PASJ, 61, L29 (2009)], we consider light curves influenced by the orbital inclination and eccentricity of a companion in orbit around a transiting extrasolar planet (in a planet-satellite system or a hypothetical true binary). We show that the semimajor axis, eccentricity and inclination angle of a `moon' orbit around the host planet can be determined by transit method alone. For this purpose, we present a formulation for the parameter determinations in a small-eccentricity approximation as well as in the exact form. As a res…
Using the period and mass data of two hundred and seventy-nine extrasolar planets, we have constructed a coupled period-mass function through the non-parametric approach. This analytic expression of the coupled period-mass function has been obtained for the first time in this field. Moreover, due to a moderate period-mass correlation, the shapes of mass/period functions vary as a function of period/mass. These results of mass and period functions give way to two important implications: (1) the deficit of massive close-in planets is confirmed, and (2) the more massive planets have larger ranges…
Since its first discovery, most extrasolar planets were detected using radial velocity (RV) method. However, the RV method does not provide all parameters required to characterize a planetary system. Recently, Charbonneau et al.(2000) and Brown et al(2001)have shown that the RV planet orbiting HD 209458 can be observed using transit method yielding some additional information. As pointed out by Castellano (2004), this method can be undertaken using small aperture telescopes and inexpensive CCDs. We report here new observations of planetary transit in HD 102195 and HD 209458 performed at the Bo…
Using the period and mass data of two hundred and seventy-nine extrasolar planets, we have constructed a coupled period-mass function through the non-parametric approach. This analytic expression of the coupled period-mass function has been obtained for the first time in this field. Moreover, due to a moderate period-mass correlation, the shapes of mass/period functions vary as a function of period/mass. These results of mass and period functions give way to two important implications: (1) the deficit of massive close-in planets is confirmed, and (2) the more massive planets have larger ranges…
We report on the discovery of a substellar companion or a massive Jupiter orbiting the G5V star HD16760 with the spectrograph SOPHIE installed on the OHP 1.93-m telescope. Characteristics and performances of the spectrograph are presented, as well as the SOPHIE exoplanet consortium program. With a minimum mass of 14.3 Mjup, an orbital period of 465 days and an eccentricity of 0.067, HD16760b seems to be located just at the end of the mass distribution of giant planets, close to planet/brown-dwarf transition. Its quite circular orbit supports a formation in a gaseous protoplanetary disk.
We introduce EXOFIT, a Bayesian tool for estimating orbital parameters of extrasolar planets from radial velocity measurements. EXOFIT can search for either one or two planets at present. EXOFIT employs Markov Chain Monte Carlo method implemented in an object oriented manner. As an example we re-analyze the orbital solution of HD155358 and the results are compared with that of the published orbital parameters. In order to check the agreement of the EXOFIT orbital parameters with the published ones we examined radial velocity data of 30 stars taken randomly from www.exoplanet.eu. We show that w…
While the solar system contains as many as about 20 times more moons than planets, no moon has been definitively detected around any of the thousands of extrasolar planets so far. The question naturally arises why an exomoon detection has not yet been achieved. This cumulative habilitation thesis covers three of the key aspects related to the ongoing search for extrasolar moons: 1. the possible formation scenarios for moons around extrasolar planets; 2. new detection strategies for these moons; and 3. the potential of exomoons as hosts to extrasolar life. This work is structured as follows. Pa…
In recent years it has been shown that the tidal coupling between extrasolar planets and their stars could be an important mechanism leading to orbital evolution. Both the tides the planet raises on the star and vice versa are important and dissipation efficiencies ranging over four orders of magnitude are being used. In addition, the discovery of extrasolar planets extremely close to their stars has made it clear that the estimates of the tidal quality factor, Q, of the stars based on Jupiter and its satellite system and on main sequence binary star observations are too low, resulting in life…
We develop an idealized dynamical model to predict the typical properties of outer extrasolar planetary systems, at radii beyond 5 AU. Our hypothesis is that dynamical evolution in outer planetary systems is controlled by a combination of planet-planet scattering and planetary interactions with an exterior disk of small bodies ("planetesimals"). Using 5,000 long duration N-body simulations, we follow the evolution of three planets surrounded by a 50 Earth mass primordial planetesimal disk. For large planet masses (above that of Saturn) the influence of the disk is modest, and we recover the ob…
Extrasolar planets are not named and are referred to only by their assigned scientific designation. The reason given by the IAU to not name the planets is that it is considered impractical as planets are expected to be common. I advance some reasons as to why this logic is flawed, and suggest names for the 403 extrasolar planet candidates known as of Oct 2009. The names follow a scheme of association with the constellation that the host star pertains to, and therefore are mostly drawn from Roman-Greek mythology. Other mythologies may also be used given that a suitable association is establishe…
We investigate baroclinic instability in flow conditions relevant to hot extrasolar planets. The instability is important for transporting and mixing heat, as well as for influencing large-scale variability on the planets. Both linear normal mode analysis and non-linear initial value calculations are carried out -- focusing on the freely-evolving, adiabatic situation. Using a high-resolution general circulation model (GCM) which solves the traditional primitive equations, we show that large-scale jets similar to those observed in current GCM simulations of hot extrasolar giant planets are like…
Based on a suite of Monte Carlo simulations, I show that a stellar-mass dependent lifetime of the gas disks from which planets form can explain the lack of hot Jupiters/close-in giant planets around high-mass stars and other key features of the observed semimajor axis distribution of radial velocity-detected giant planets. Using reasonable parameters for the Type II migration rate, regions of planet formation, and timescales for gas giant core formation, I construct synthetic distributions of jovian planets. A planet formation/migration model assuming a stellar mass-dependent gas disk lifetime…
Gravitational microlensing provides a unique window on the properties and prevalence of extrasolar planetary systems because of its ability to find low-mass planets at separations of a few AU. The early evidence from microlensing indicates that the most common type of exoplanet yet detected are the so-called "super-Earth" planets of ~10 Earth-masses at a separation of a few AU from their host stars. The detection of two such planets indicates that roughly one third of stars have such planets in the separation range 1.5-4 AU, which is about an order of magnitude larger than the prevalence of ga…
