Types of Hot Jupiter Atmospheres

Abstract

Hot Jupiters, i.e. exoplanet gas giants, having masses comparable to the mass of Jupiter and semimajor axes shorter than 0.1 AU, are a unique class of objects. Since they are so close to the host stars, their atmospheres form and evolve under the action of very active gas dynamical processes caused by the gravitational field and irradiation of the host star. As a matter of fact, the atmospheres of several of these planets fill their Roche lobes , which results in a powerful outflow of material from the planet towards the host star. The energy budget of this process is so important that it almost solely governs the evolution of hot Jupiters gaseous envelopes. Based on the years of experience in the simulations of gas dynamics in mass-exchanging close binary stars, we have investigated specific features of hot Jupiters atmospheres. The analytical estimates and results of 3D numerical simulations, discussed in this Chapter, show that the gaseous envelopes around hot Jupiters may be significantly non-spherical and, at the same time, stationary and long-lived. These results are of fundamental importance for the interpretation of observational data.