Observations Of Planets Research Articles

ABSOLUTE CALIBRATION OF THE RADIO ASTRONOMY FLUX DENSITY SCALE AT 22 TO 43 GHz USING PLANCK

ABSTRACT The Planck mission detected thousands of extragalactic radio sources at frequencies from 28 to 857 GHz. Planck's calibration is absolute (in the sense that it is based on the satellite’s annual motion around the Sun and the temperature of the cosmic microwave background), and its beams are well characterized at sub-percent levels. Thus, Planck's flux density measurements of compact sources are absolute in the same sense. We have made coordinated Very Large Array (VLA) and Australia Telescope Compact Array (ATCA) observations of 65 strong, unresolved Planck sources in order to transfer Planck's calibration to ground-based instruments at 22, 28, and 43 GHz. The results are compared to microwave flux density scales currently based on planetary observations. Despite the scatter introduced by the variability of many of the sources, the flux density scales are determined to 1%–2% accuracy. At 28 GHz, the flux density scale used by the VLA runs 2%–3% ± 1.0% below Planck values with an uncertainty of ± 1.0 % ; at 43 GHz, the discrepancy increases to 5%–6% ± 1.4% for both ATCA and the VLA.

Far-infrared photometric observations of the outer planets and satellites withHerschel-PACS

We present all Herschel PACS photometer observations of Mars, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, Callisto, Ganymede, and Titan. All measurements were carefully inspected for quality problems, were reduced in a (semi-)standard way, and were calibrated. The derived flux densities are tied to the standard PACS photometer response calibration, which is based on repeated measurements of five fiducial stars. The overall absolute flux uncertainty is dominated by the estimated 5% model uncertainty of the stellar models in the PACS wavelength range between 60 and 210 micron. A comparison with the corresponding planet and satellite models shows excellent agreement for Uranus, Neptune, and Titan, well within the specified 5%. Callisto is brighter than our model predictions by about 4-8%, Ganymede by about 14-21%. We discuss possible reasons for the model offsets. The measurements of these very bright point-like sources, together with observations of stars and asteroids, show the high reliability of the PACS photometer observations and the linear behavior of the PACS bolometer source fluxes over more than four orders of magnitude (from mJy levels up to more than 1000 Jy). Our results show the great potential of using the observed solar system targets for cross-calibration purposes with other ground-based, airborne, and space-based instruments and projects. At the same time, the PACS results will lead to improved model solutions for future calibration applications.

Science yield estimate with the Wide-Field Infrared Survey Telescope coronagraph

The coronagraph instrument (CGI) on the Wide-Field Infrared Survey Telescope will directly image and spectrally characterize planets and circumstellar disks around nearby stars. Here we estimate the expected science yield of the CGI for known radial-velocity (RV) planets and potential circumstellar disks. The science return is estimated for three types of coronagraphs: the hybrid Lyot and shaped pupil are the currently planned designs, and the phase-induced amplitude apodizing complex mask coronagraph is the backup design. We compare the potential performance of each type for imaging as well as spectroscopy. We find that the RV targets can be imaged in sufficient numbers to produce substantial advances in the science of nearby exoplanets. To illustrate the potential for circumstellar disk detections, we estimate the brightness of zodiacal-type disks, which could be detected simultaneously during RV planet observations.

HIDING IN THE SHADOWS. II. COLLISIONAL DUST AS EXOPLANET MARKERS

ABSTRACT Observations of the youngest planets (∼1–10 Myr for a transitional disk) will increase the accuracy of our planet formation models. Unfortunately, observations of such planets are challenging and time-consuming to undertake, even in ideal circumstances. Therefore, we propose the determination of a set of markers that can preselect promising exoplanet-hosting candidate disks. To this end, N-body simulations were conducted to investigate the effect of an embedded Jupiter-mass planet on the dynamics of the surrounding planetesimal disk and the resulting creation of second-generation collisional dust. We use a new collision model that allows fragmentation and erosion of planetesimals, and dust-sized fragments are simulated in a post-process step including non-gravitational forces due to stellar radiation and a gaseous protoplanetary disk. Synthetic images from our numerical simulations show a bright double ring at 850 μm for a low-eccentricity planet, whereas a high-eccentricity planet would produce a characteristic inner ring with asymmetries in the disk. In the presence of first-generation primordial dust these markers would be difficult to detect far from the orbit of the embedded planet, but would be detectable inside a gap of planetary origin in a transitional disk.

FUJIN-2:Balloon Borne Telescope for Optical Observation of Planets

FUJIN-2:Balloon Borne Telescope for Optical Observation of Planets

Giant Planet Observations with the James Webb Space Telescope

This white paper examines the benefit of the upcoming James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) for studies of the Solar System's four giant planets: Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune. JWST's superior sensitivity, combined with high spatial and spectral resolution, will enable near- and mid-infrared imaging and spectroscopy of these objects with unprecedented quality. In this paper, we discuss some of the myriad scientific investigations possible with JWST regarding the giant planets. This discussion is preceded by the specifics of JWST instrumentation most relevant to giant-planet observations. We conclude with identification of desired pre-launch testing and operational aspects of JWST that would greatly benefit future studies of the giant planets.

A comparative study of solar wind and foreshock turbulence near Uranus orbit

In this work we have used statistical and wavelet techniques to characterize some properties from the Uranus foreshock and the nearby background solar wind. Results of the wavelet spectra showed that the dominant waves have common periodicities at ~12min, ~31min and ~65min for both the background and foreshock regions. However, the average wave power for the foreshock interval was about 10 times higher than for the background solar wind. These common periods found both in the foreshock and solar wind may be an indicative of the nature of the turbulent flow at this distance from the Sun. The foreshock to background magnetic field variance ratio is about 3.0. Minimum variance results show that most of waves have a compression factor of 0.65 and propagate obliquely to the magnetic field direction. The main period found at ~10–15min is close to the frequency observed for upstream waves based on observations of other planets and that are interpreted in terms of ion cyclotron resonance. Results from kurtosis parameter showed a Gaussian behavior indicating there is no significant intermittent physical processes acting over these components in the background solar wind. Further, over larger scales, some components presented a sub-Gaussian behavior, possibly associated to quasi-periodic waves with finite amplitudes.

AEOLUS: A MARKOV CHAIN MONTE CARLO CODE FOR MAPPING ULTRACOOL ATMOSPHERES. AN APPLICATION ON JUPITER AND BROWN DWARFHSTLIGHT CURVES

Deducing the cloud cover and its temporal evolution from the observed planetary spectra and phase curves can give us major insight into the atmospheric dynamics. In this paper, we present Aeolus, a Markov chain Monte Carlo code that maps the structure of brown dwarf and other ultracool atmospheres. We validated Aeolus on a set of unique Jupiter Hubble Space Telescope (HST) light curves. Aeolus accurately retrieves the properties of the major features of the Jovian atmosphere, such as the Great Red Spot and a major 5 μm hot spot. Aeolus is the first mapping code validated on actual observations of a giant planet over a full rotational period. For this study, we applied Aeolus to J- and H-band HST light curves of 2MASS J21392676+0220226 and 2MASS J0136565+093347. Aeolus retrieves three spots at the top of the atmosphere (per observational wavelength) of these two brown dwarfs, with a surface coverage of 21% ± 3% and 20.3% ± 1.5%, respectively. The Jupiter HST light curves will be publicly available via ADS/VIZIR.

Telluride buried channel waveguides operating from 6 to 20 μm for photonic applications

One of the technological challenges of direct observation of extra-solar planets by nulling interferometry is the development of a modal filter operating from 6 to 20μm. In the present paper a candidate technology for the fabrication of such modal filters is presented: Integrated Optics. A solution based on all-telluride buried channel waveguides is considered. In the proposed waveguides, vertical guiding of light is achieved by a 15μm-thick Te83Ge17 core film deposited onto a lower-index Te75Ge15Ga10 substrate, and covered by a 15μm-thick Te76Ge24 superstrate. Horizontal guiding of light is obtained by modifying the geometry of the core layer by ion beam etching.As this stage, all-telluride buried channel waveguide prototypes demonstrate light guiding and transmission from 2 to 20μm. The validity of the technology and the good quality of the fabrication process, in particular the input and output facets surface finish are thus confirmed. These results consolidate the potential of Te-based integrated optics components for nulling interferometry.

Numerical estimation of the sensitivity of INPOP planetary ephemerides to general relativity parameters

In this paper, are given numerical estimations of the sensitivity of the latest version of the INPOP planetary ephemerides (INPOP13c) to GR parameters: the PPN parameters $$\beta $$ , $$\gamma $$ , and the oblateness of the Sun J $$_{2}^{\odot }$$ . Time variations of the gravitational mass of the Sun $$\mu $$ are also considered. A first estimation is obtained by fitting these parameters with the classic method of least squares to planetary observations together with other parameters used for planetary ephemeris construction. A second approach is investigated using a new method of construction of alternative ephemerides. They are based on the same dynamical modeling and observational samples but in a non-GR framework with non-zero or non-unity GR parameters. Some alternative ephemerides are found to be close to INPOP13c and acceptable intervals of GR parameters are then defined at the light of the present INPOP13c accuracy. These intervals are compared with the one obtained with the direct least square estimation and with those extracted from the literature. No violation of GR is at this point noticeable.

Minor Planet Center: data processing challenges

AbstractThe Minor Planet Center receives up to several million astrometric observations of minor planets and comets each month. Given the volume of observations, the sheer number of known objects against which to possibly match, the shortness of the time interval over which each object was likely observed, and the uncertainties in the positions, and occasionally possible errors in times, reported, a number of data processing challenges present themselves. These include: Identifying observations of objects reported as new with already known objects; linking together sets of observations from different nights which may belong to the same object; determining if a set of observations has been assigned to the wrong object; determining if an object with a very short arc is possibly a Near-Earth object; prioritizing newly discovered objects in order of need of follow up; and, efficiently matching one or more observations with known objects.

Masses of asteroids and total mass of the main asteroid belt

AbstractAn estimation of the mass of the main asteroid belt was made on the basis of the new version of EPM2014 ephemerides of the Institute of Applied Astronomy of Russian Academy of Sciences using about 800000 positional observations of planets and spacecraft. We obtained the individual estimations of masses of large asteroids from radar data, as well as estimates of the masses of asteroids by using known diameters and estimated average densities for the three taxonomic types (C, S, M), and used the known mass values of binary asteroids and asteroids to which spacecraft approached. A two-dimensional homogeneous annulus with dimensions corresponding observed width of the main asteroid belt (2.06 au and 3.27 au) was used instead of a previous massive one-dimensional ring for modeling total perturbations from small asteroids. The obtained value of the total mass of the main asteroid belt is (12.25 ± 0.19)10−10M⊙.

Coronagraph experiment on dark-hole control by speckle area nulling method

In high-contrast imaging optical systems for direct observation of planets outside our solar system, adaptive optics with an accuracy of lambda/10,000 root mean square is required to reduce the speckle noise down to 1e-10 level in addition to the nulling coronagraph which eliminate the diffracted light. We developed the speckle area nulling (SAN) method as a new dark-hole control algorithm which is capable of controlling speckle electric field in a wide area quickly, in spite of an extension of speckle nulling, and is robust not relying upon an optical model. We conducted a validation experiment for the SAN method with a monochromatic light and succeeded in reducing the intensity of areal speckles by 4.4e-2.

Determination of the Value of the Heliocentric Gravitational Constant (GM⊙) from Modern Observations of Planets and Spacecraft

The history of estimation of the heliocentric gravitational constant is given. Initially the value of GM⊙ was based on the mean period of motion of the Earth around the Sun, then on estimation of the value of the astronomical unit, and finally the modern value of GM⊙ is determined with the extraordinarily high accuracy, GM⊙ = 132 712 440 042 ± 10 (km3/s2), while fitting ephemerides to high-precision radar observations.

Observations of exoplanets in time-evolving habitable zones of pre-main-sequence M dwarfs

It is recently proposed that planets in the habitable zones (HZ) of pre-main-sequence (PMS) M dwarfs are good targets for the detection of habitable environments. In this note we show that future ground-based telescopes will be able to observe planets in time-evolving HZ of PMS M dwarfs with duration 10–100Myrs. Based on X-ray measurements, there are >18 M0–M4 PMS stars within 10pc, the characterization of potentially habitable exoplanets around which could provide highly valuable information regarding the evolution of habitable environments. There are tens of M dwarfs within 10pc with X-ray to total luminosity ratios similar to that of the young Sun, the observations of potential planets around which could significantly improve our understanding of the physical states of early Solar System rocky planets.

Predicting exoplanet observability in time, contrast, separation, and polarization, in scattered light

Polarimetry is one of the keys to enhanced direct imaging of exoplanets. Not only does it deliver a differential observable providing extra contrast, but when coupled with spectroscopy, it also reveals valuable information on the exoplanetary atmospheric composition. Nevertheless, angular separation and contrast ratio to the host-star make for extremely challenging observation. Producing detailed predictions for exactly how the expected signals should appear is of critical importance for the designs and observational strategies of tomorrow's telescopes. We aim at accurately determining the magnitudes and evolution of the main observational signatures for imaging an exoplanet: separation, contrast ratio to the host-star and polarization as a function of the orbital geometry and the reflectance parameters of the exoplanet. These parameters were used to construct polarized-reflectance model based on the input of orbital parameters and two albedo values. The model is able to calculate a variety of observational predictions for exoplanets at any orbital time. The inter-dependency of the three main observational criteria -separation, contrast ratio, polarization- result in a complex time-evolution of the system. They greatly affect the viability of planet observation by direct imaging. We introduce a new generic display of the main observational criteria, which enables an observer to determine whether an exoplanet is within detection limits: the Separation-POlarization-Contrast diagrams (SPOC). We explore the complex effect of orbital and albedo parameters on the visibility of an exoplanet. The code we developed is available for public use and collaborative improvement on the python package index, together with its documentation. It is another step towards a full comprehensive simulation tool for predicting and interpreting the results of future observational exoplanetary discovery campaigns.

The role of particle size in the laboratory reflectance spectra of pyroxenes: The case of the 670-nm minor feature

Reflectance spectroscopy is a very helpful tool for remote sensing investigations and has been widely used in terrestrial as well as planetary observations to study the surface composition. From this perspective, the visible (Vis) and near-infrared (NIR) regions of the spectrum, where several diagnostic absorption features of minerals are located, are well suited for the identification of such materials, in particular of rock-forming silicates. Among them, pyroxenes, which have been discovered on the surface of a number of different solar system bodies, play an important role.Up to now, both laboratory and remote sensing spectroscopic studies have been focused mainly on the two major bands at about 1 and 2µm (the so-called Band I and Band II, respectively), while little attention has been paid to the minor bands falling in the visible range. One of the most important of them, present in many pyroxenes as well as in olivines, is the weak feature (reflectance minimum) near 670nm, generally characterized by its variable wings (reflectance maxima) at about 570nm and 720nm. The intensity and the exact position of this feature depend on the type of pyroxene as well as on the grain size of the particles under consideration.In this work we present the Vis/NIR experimental reflectance spectra concerning enstatite and diopside, which are excellent representative of Low Calcium Pyroxenes (typically orthopyroxenes), and High Calcium Pyroxenes (typically clinopyroxenes) respectively. The results are very interesting and show a good correlation between the grain size of our samples and the relative intensities of the reflectance maxima occurring on both sides of the 670nm feature. A similar study performed on Acfer 353, a pyroxene-rich eucritic meteorite of the Howardite–Eucrite–Diogenite family, of putative Vestan origin, shows that also in this case the variability in the Vis region of the spectra is linked to the grain size of the meteoritic particles. The connection between grain size and the behavior of the 670nm feature can potentially be used to derive the average dimension of the regolith existing on the surface of planets and minor bodies.Both laboratory and observational study of the minor features, frequently ignored in the interpretation of the spectra acquired in remote sensing, can give complementary and useful information and thus can definitely contribute to a better knowledge of the mineralogy of planetary and asteroidal surfaces.

Systematic characterization of the Herschel SPIRE Fourier Transform Spectrometer★

A systematic programme of calibration observations was carried out to monitor the performance of the SPIRE FTS instrument on board the Herschel Space Observatory. Observations of planets (including the prime point-source calibrator, Uranus), asteroids, line sources, dark sky, and cross-calibration sources were made in order to monitor repeatability and sensitivity, and to improve FTS calibration. We present a complete analysis of the full set of calibration observations and use them to assess the performance of the FTS. Particular care is taken to understand and separate out the effect of pointing uncertainties, including the position of the internal beam steering mirror for sparse observations in the early part of the mission. The repeatability of spectral line centre positions is <5km/s, for lines with signal-to-noise ratios >40, corresponding to <0.5-2.0% of a resolution element. For spectral line flux, the repeatability is better than 6%, which improves to 1-2% for spectra corrected for pointing offsets. The continuum repeatability is 4.4% for the SLW band and 13.6% for the SSW band, which reduces to ~1% once the data have been corrected for pointing offsets. Observations of dark sky were used to assess the sensitivity and the systematic offset in the continuum, both of which were found to be consistent across the FTS detector arrays. The average point-source calibrated sensitivity for the centre detectors is 0.20 and 0.21 Jy [1 sigma; 1 hour], for SLW and SSW. The average continuum offset is 0.40 Jy for the SLW band and 0.28 Jy for the SSW band.

THE PSEUDO-ZODI PROBLEM FOR EDGE-ON PLANETARY SYSTEMS

Future direct observations of extrasolar Earth-sized planets in the habitable zone could be hampered by a worrisome source of noise, starlight-reflecting exozodiacal dust. Mid-infrared surveys are currently underway to constrain the amount of exozodiacal dust in the habitable zones around nearby stars. However, at visible wavelengths another source of dust, invisible to these surveys, may dominate over exozodiacal dust. For systems observed near edge-on, a cloud of dust with face-on optical depth 10^-7 beyond ~5 AU can mimic the surface brightness of a cloud of exozodiacal dust with equal optical depth if the dust grains are sufficiently forward-scattering. We posit that dust migrating inward from cold debris belts via Poynting-Robertson drag could produce this "pseudo-zodiacal" effect, potentially making it ~50% as common as exozodiacal clouds. We place constraints on the disk radii and scattering phase function required to produce the effect.

The Auroral Planetary Imaging and Spectroscopy (APIS) service

The Auroral Planetary Imaging and Spectroscopy (APIS) service, accessible online, provides an open and interactive access to processed auroral observations of the outer planets and their satellites. Such observations are of interest for a wide community at the interface between planetology and magnetospheric and heliospheric physics. APIS consists of (i) a high level database, built from planetary auroral observations acquired by the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) since 1997 with its mostly used Far-UltraViolet spectro-imagers, (ii) a dedicated search interface aimed at browsing efficiently this database through relevant conditional search criteria and (iii) the ability to interactively work with the data online through plotting tools developed by the Virtual Observatory (VO) community, such as Aladin and Specview. This service is VO compliant and can therefore also been queried by external search tools of the VO community. The diversity of available data and the capability to sort them out by relevant physical criteria shall in particular facilitate statistical studies, on long-term scales and/or multi-instrumental multi-spectral combined analysis.