Abstract
To calculate the boundaries of the habitable zone (HZ) in a multiple star system, it is assumed that the HZ is a region where an Earth-like planet (with similar atmospheric composition as that of Earth) and a sufficient amount of water can permanently maintain liquid water on its solid surface. The locations of the boundaries of the HZ, and therefore the capability of the planet in maintaining conditions for habitability, depend on the total flux received at the top of its atmosphere. Since the atmosphere converts stellar insolation to surface temperature, the interaction of planet atmosphere with the stellar radiation plays an important role in considering whether a planet can maintain liquid water on its surface and allow for detectable habitable conditions. This interaction strongly depends on the stellar spectral energy distribution (SED), implying that stars with different energy distributions will contribute differently to the absolute incident flux at the top of the planet’s atmosphere. To determine the contribution of a star taking into account its SED, it is necessary to define a spectral weight factor Wi(f, Ti), where i denotes the ith star, Ti is the star’s effective temperature, and f represents the atmosphere’s cloud fraction. The contribution of each star of the system to the total flux at the top of the planet’s atmosphere can be therefore written as
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