A PRECISE WATER ABUNDANCE MEASUREMENT FOR THE HOT JUPITER WASP-43b

Kreidberg, Laura; Bean, Jacob L.; Désert, Jean Michel; Line, Michael R.; Fortney, Jonathan J.; Madhusudhan, Nikku; Stevenson, Kevin B.; Showman, Adam P.; Charbonneau, David; McCullough, P. R.; Seager, Sara; Burrows, Adam; Henry, Gregory W.; Williamson, Michael; Kataria, Tiffany; Homeier, D.

doi:10.1088/2041-8205/793/2/l27

Cited by 371 publications

(536 citation statements)

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“…On a large scale, the IR transit and eclipse spectra of hot-Jupiters seem to be dominated by the signature of water vapour (e.g. [10,21,26,34,38,47,48,50,54,74,91,111,[159][160][161][168][169][170][171]), similarly, the atmosphere of hot-Neptune HAT-P-11b appears to be water-rich [67]. The data available for other warm Neptunes, such as GJ 436b, GJ 3470b are suggestive of cloudy atmospheres and do not always allow a conclusive identification of their composition [22,65,70,88,117,156].…”

Section: Exoplanets Todaymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The data available for other warm Neptunes, such as GJ 436b, GJ 3470b are suggestive of cloudy atmospheres and do not always allow a conclusive identification of their composition [22,65,70,88,117,156]. The analysis of the transmission and day-side spectra for the transiting 6.5 M Earth super-Earth GJ 1214b suggests either a metal-rich or a cloudy atmosphere [19,25,90,91,157].…”

Section: Exoplanets Todaymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…These were achieved with Spitzer [107]. See also [52,56,121] All three techniques have already been used very successfully from the optical to the near-and mid-infrared, showing molecular, atomic absorption and Rayleigh scattering features in transmission [21,25,36,47,48,55,86,89,101,132,147,148,160,[168][169][170]182] and/or emission spectra [38,74,91,156,159,161,171] of a few of the brightest and hottest transiting gas giants, using the Hubble and Spitzer space telescopes. In addition, infrared phase variations have been measured at several wavelengths using Spitzer, showing only a relatively small temperature difference (300 K) between the planet's day and night-side -implying an efficient redistribution of the absorbed stellar energy [86].…”

Section: Transits Eclipses and Phase-curvesmentioning

confidence: 99%

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The EChO science case

et al. 2015

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The discovery of almost two thousand exoplanets has revealed an unexpectedly diverse planet population. We see gas giants in few-day orbits, whole multi-planet systems within the orbit of Mercury, and new populations of planets with masses between that of the Earth and Neptune-all unknown in the Solar System. Observations to date have shown that our Solar System is certainly not representative of the general population of planets in our Milky Way. The key science questions that urgently need addressing are therefore: What are exoplanets made of? Why are planets as they are? How do planetary systems work and what causes the exceptional diversity observed as compared to the Solar System? The EChO (Exoplanet Characterisation Observatory) space mission was conceived to take up the challenge to explain this diversity in terms of formation, evolution, internal structure and planet and atmospheric composition. This requires in-depth spectroscopic knowledge of the atmospheres of a large and well-defined planet sample for which precise physical, chemical and dynamical information can be obtained. In order to fulfil this ambitious scientific program, EChO was designed as a dedicated survey mission for transit and eclipse spectroscopy capable of observing a large, diverse and well-defined planet sample within its 4-year mission lifetime. The transit and eclipse spectroscopy method, whereby the signal from the star and planet are differentiated using knowledge of the planetary ephemerides, allows us to measure atmospheric signals from the planet at levels of at least 10 −4 relative to the star. This can only be achieved in conjunction with a carefully designed stable payload and satellite platform. It is also necessary to provide broad instantaneous wavelength coverage to detect as many molecular species as possible, to probe the thermal structure of the planetary atmospheres and to correct for the contaminating effects of the stellar photosphere. This requires wavelength coverage of at least 0.55 to 11 μm with a goal of covering from 0.4 to 16 μm. Only modest spectral resolving power is needed, with R~300 for wavelengths less than 5 μm and R~30 for wavelengths greater than this. spectroscopy technique means that no spatial resolution is required. A telescope collecting area of about 1 m 2 is sufficiently large to achieve the necessary spectro-photometric precision: for the Phase A study a 1.13 m 2 telescope, diffraction limited at 3 μm has been adopted. Placing the satellite at L2 provides a cold and stable thermal environment as well as a large field of regard to allow efficient time-critical observation of targets randomly distributed over the sky. EChO has been conceived to achieve a single goal: exoplanet spectroscopy. The spectral coverage and signal-to-noise to be achieved by EChO, thanks to its high stability and dedicated design, would be a game changer by allowing atmospheric composition to be measured with unparalleled exactness: at least a factor 10 more precise and a factor 10 to 1000 more accurate tha...

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Section: Exoplanets Todaymentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Exoplanets Todaymentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Transits Eclipses and Phase-curvesmentioning

confidence: 99%

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The EChO science case

et al. 2015

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“…Additionally, WASP63b occupies an important, underexplored region of transmission spectroscopy due to its mass. Most exoplanets studied in detail with transmission spectroscopy are either hot Jupiters of mass (∼1-3 M J ) (e.g., Deming et al 2013;Kreidberg et al 2014aKreidberg et al , 2015Sing et al 2016) or Super-Earth-to-Neptune mass planets (∼0.01-0.1 M J ) (e.g., Fraine et al 2014;Knutson et al 2014;Kreidberg et al 2014b). In order to understand formation and evolution processes, it's important to understand the composition of atmospheres over a full and continuous range of masses (e.g., Mordasini et al 2016).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Here, we observe WASP-63b to evaluate its suitability as a prime candidate to test the capabilities of JWST. We can use the strength of the water absorption feature at 1.4 μm as a way to screen potential targets for the presence of obscuring aerosols and determine the amplitude of predicted spectral features (e.g., Deming et al 2013;Kreidberg et al 2014a;Sing et al 2016;Stevenson 2016). Ideally, a clear atmosphere with large amplitude spectroscopic features will be best suited for benchmarking the instruments and identifying their systematics.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Community Targets of JWST’s Early Release Science Program: Evaluation of WASP-63b

Kilpatrick

Cubillos

Stevenson

et al. 2018

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We present observations of WASP-63b by the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) as part of "A Preparatory Program to Identify the Single Best Transiting Exoplanet for James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) Early Release Science (ERS)." WASP-63b is one of the community targets under consideration for the JWST ERS program. We present a spectrum derived from a single observation by HST Wide Field Camera3 in the near-infrared. We engaged groups across the transiting exoplanet community to participate in the analysis of the data and present results from each. Extraction of the transmission spectrum by several independent analyses find an H 2 O absorption feature with varying degrees of significance ranging from 1σ to 3σ. The feature, in all cases, is muted in comparison to a clear atmosphere at solar composition. The reasons for the muting of this feature are ambiguous due to a degeneracy between clouds and composition. The data does not yield robust detections of any molecular species other than H 2 O. The group was motivated to perform an additional set of retrieval exercises to investigate an apparent bump in the spectrum at ∼1.55 μm. We explore possible disequilibrium chemistry and find this feature is consistent with super-solar HCN abundance but it is questionable if the required mixing ratio of HCN is chemically and physically plausible. The ultimate goal of this study is to vet WASP-63b as a potential community target to best demonstrate the capabilities and systematics of JWST instruments for transiting exoplanet science. In the case of WASP-63b, the presence of a detectable water feature indicates that WASP-63b remains a plausible target for JWST observations.

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Illusion and reality in the atmospheres of exoplanets

2017

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The atmospheres of exoplanets reveal all their properties beyond mass, radius, and orbit. Based on bulk densities, we know that exoplanets larger than 1.5 Earth radii must have gaseous envelopes and, hence, atmospheres. We discuss contemporary techniques for characterization of exoplanetary atmospheres. The measurements are difficult, because—even in current favorable cases—the signals can be as small as 0.001% of the host star's flux. Consequently, some early results have been illusory and not confirmed by subsequent investigations. Prominent illusions to date include polarized scattered light, temperature inversions, and the existence of carbon planets. The field moves from the first tentative and often incorrect conclusions, converging to the reality of exoplanetary atmospheres. That reality is revealed using transits for close‐in exoplanets and direct imaging for young or massive exoplanets in distant orbits. Several atomic and molecular constituents have now been robustly detected in exoplanets as small as Neptune. In our current observations, the effects of clouds and haze appear ubiquitous. Topics at the current frontier include the measurement of heavy element abundances in giant planets, detection of carbon‐based molecules, measurement of atmospheric temperature profiles, definition of heat circulation efficiencies for tidally locked planets, and the push to detect and characterize the atmospheres of super‐Earths. Future observatories for this quest include the James Webb Space Telescope and the new generation of extremely large telescopes on the ground. On a more distant horizon, NASA's study concepts for the Habitable Exoplanet Imaging Mission (HabEx) and the Large UV/Optical/Infrared Surveyor (LUVOIR) missions could extend the study of exoplanetary atmospheres to true twins of Earth.

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A PRECISE WATER ABUNDANCE MEASUREMENT FOR THE HOT JUPITER WASP-43b

Cited by 371 publications

References 49 publications

The EChO science case

The EChO science case

Community Targets of JWST’s Early Release Science Program: Evaluation of WASP-63b

Illusion and reality in the atmospheres of exoplanets

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