INFRARED TRANSMISSION SPECTROSCOPY OF THE EXOPLANETS HD 209458b AND XO-1b USING THE WIDE FIELD CAMERA-3 ON THE HUBBLE SPACE TELESCOPE
Drake Deming,Drake Deming,A. Wilkins,Peter R. McCullough,Adam Burrows,Jonathan J. Fortney,Eric Agol,Eric Agol,Ian Dobbs-Dixon,Ian Dobbs-Dixon,Nikku Madhusudhan,Nicolas Crouzet,Jean-Michel Desert,Ronald L. Gilliland,Korey Haynes,Korey Haynes,Heather Knutson,Michael R. Line,Zazralt Magic,Avi Mandell,Sukrit Ranjan,David Charbonneau,Mark Clampin,Sara Seager,Adam P. Showman +24 more
TLDR
In this paper, the authors reported WFC3 spectroscopy of the giant planets HD 209458b and XO-1b in transit, using spatial scanning mode for maximum photon-collecting efficiency.Abstract:
Exoplanetary transmission spectroscopy in the near-infrared using the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) NICMOS is currently ambiguous because different observational groups claim different results from the same data, depending on their analysis methodologies. Spatial scanning with HST/WFC3 provides an opportunity to resolve this ambiguity. We here report WFC3 spectroscopy of the giant planets HD 209458b and XO-1b in transit, using spatial scanning mode for maximum photon-collecting efficiency. We introduce an analysis technique that derives the exoplanetary transmission spectrum without the necessity of explicitly decorrelating instrumental effects, and achieves nearly photon-limited precision even at the high flux levels collected in spatial scan mode. Our errors are within 6% (XO-1) and 26% (HD 209458b) of the photon-limit at a resolving power of λ/δλ ~ 70, and are better than 0.01% per spectral channel. Both planets exhibit water absorption of approximately 200 ppm at the water peak near 1.38 μm. Our result for XO-1b contradicts the much larger absorption derived from NICMOS spectroscopy. The weak water absorption we measure for HD 209458b is reminiscent of the weakness of sodium absorption in the first transmission spectroscopy of an exoplanet atmosphere by Charbonneau et al. Model atmospheres having uniformly distributed extra opacity of 0.012 cm2 g−1 account approximately for both our water measurement and the sodium absorption. Our results for HD 209458b support the picture advocated by Pont et al. in which weak molecular absorptions are superposed on a transmission spectrum that is dominated by continuous opacity due to haze and/or dust. However, the extra opacity needed for HD 209458b is grayer than for HD 189733b, with a weaker Rayleigh component.read more
Citations
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Journal ArticleDOI
Clouds in the atmosphere of the super-Earth exoplanet GJ 1214b
Laura Kreidberg,Jacob L. Bean,Jean-Michel Desert,Björn Benneke,Drake Deming,Kevin B. Stevenson,Sara Seager,Zachory K. Berta-Thompson,Andreas Seifahrt,Derek Homeier +9 more
TL;DR: A measurement of the transmission spectrum of GJ 1214b at near-infrared wavelengths is reported, sufficiently precise to detect absorption features from a high mean-molecular-mass atmosphere and rule out cloud-free atmospheric models with compositions dominated by water, methane, carbon monoxide, nitrogen or carbon dioxide.
Journal ArticleDOI
A continuum from clear to cloudy hot-Jupiter exoplanets without primordial water depletion
David K. Sing,Jonathan J. Fortney,Nikolay Nikolov,Hannah R. Wakeford,Tiffany Kataria,Thomas M. Evans,Suzanne Aigrain,Gilda E. Ballester,Adam Burrows,Drake Deming,Jean-Michel Desert,Neale P. Gibson,Gregory W. Henry,Catherine M. Huitson,Heather Knutson,Alain Lecavelier des Etangs,Frederic Pont,Adam P. Showman,Alfred Vidal-Madjar,Michael H. Williamson,Paul Wilson +20 more
TL;DR: The difference between the planetary radius measured at optical and infrared wavelengths is an effective metric for distinguishing different atmosphere types, so that strong water absorption lines are seen in clear-atmosphere planets and the weakest features are associated with clouds and hazes.
Journal ArticleDOI
Characterizing transiting exoplanet atmospheres with jwst
Thomas P. Greene,Michael R. Line,Cezar Montero,Jonathan J. Fortney,Jacob Lustig-Yaeger,Kyle Luther +5 more
TL;DR: In this article, the authors explore how well spectra from the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) will likely constrain bulk atmospheric properties of transiting exoplanets.
Journal ArticleDOI
A PRECISE WATER ABUNDANCE MEASUREMENT FOR THE HOT JUPITER WASP-43b
Laura Kreidberg,Jacob L. Bean,Jean-Michel Desert,Michael R. Line,Jonathan J. Fortney,Nikku Madhusudhan,Kevin B. Stevenson,Adam P. Showman,David Charbonneau,Peter R. McCullough,Sara Seager,Adam Burrows,Gregory W. Henry,Michael H. Williamson,Tiffany Kataria,Derek Homeier +15 more
TL;DR: In this paper, the water abundance in the atmosphere of the 2 MJup short-period exoplanet WASP-43b was determined based on thermal emission and transmission spectroscopy measurements obtained with the Hubble Space Telescope.
Journal ArticleDOI
A featureless transmission spectrum for the Neptune-mass exoplanet GJ 436b
TL;DR: Observations of GJ 436b’s atmosphere obtained during transit indicate that the planet's transmission spectrum is featureless, ruling out cloud-free, hydrogen-dominated atmosphere models with an extremely high significance of 48σ.
References
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Journal ArticleDOI
The Optical and Near-infrared Transmission Spectrum of the Super-Earth GJ?1214b: Further Evidence for a Metal-rich Atmosphere
Jacob L. Bean,Jean-Michel Desert,Petr Kabath,B. Stalder,Sara Seager,Eliza M.-R. Kempton,Zachory K. Berta,Derek Homeier,Shane Walsh,Andreas Seifahrt +9 more
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Atmospheric Circulation of Hot Jupiters: Three-dimensional circulation models of HD 209458b and HD 189733b with Simplified Forcing
TL;DR: In this article, the authors present global, three-dimensional numerical simulations of the atmospheric circulation on HD 209458b and HD 189733b and calculate the infrared spectra and light curves predicted by these simulations, which are compared with available observations.
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Discovery and Characterization of Transiting SuperEarths Using an All-Sky Transit Survey and Follow-up by the James Webb Space Telescope
D. Deming,Sara Seager,Joshua N. Winn,E. Miller-Ricci,Mark Clampin,Don J. Lindler,Thomas P. Greene,David Charbonneau,Greg Laughlin,George R. Ricker,D. W. Latham,Kimberly Ennico +11 more
TL;DR: In this article, the authors evaluate the prospects for an all-sky transit survey targeted to the brightest stars, that would find the most favorable cases for photometric and spectroscopic characterization using the JWST.
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A spectrum of an extrasolar planet
TL;DR: Observations of the infrared spectrum of the transiting extrasolar planet HD 209458b reveal a hot thermal continuum for the planetary spectrum, with an approximately constant ratio to the stellar flux over this wavelength range.
Journal ArticleDOI
The Optical and Near-Infrared Transmission Spectrum of the Super-Earth GJ1214b: Further Evidence for a Metal-Rich Atmosphere
Jacob L. Bean,Jean-Michel Desert,Petr Kabath,B. Stalder,Sara Seager,Eliza M.-R. Kempton,Zachory K. Berta,Derek Homeier,Shane Walsh,Andreas Seifahrt +9 more
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors present an investigation of the transmission spectrum of the 6.5 M_earth planet GJ1214b based on new ground-based observations of transits of the planet in the optical and near-infrared, and on previously published data.
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