A featureless transmission spectrum for the Neptune-mass exoplanet GJ 436b

Nature

Volumn 505, Issue 7481, 2014, Pages 66-68

  Knutson, Heather A ^a   Benneke, Björn ^a,b   Deming, Drake ^c   Homeier, Derek ^d  

^a CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY   (United States)

^b MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY   (United States)

^c Bldg 142   (United States)

^d CENTRE DE RECHERCHE ASTROPHYSIQUE DE LYON   (France)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

CARBON MONOXIDE; HELIUM; HYDROGEN; METHANE;

CARBON MONOXIDE; CHEMICAL COMPOSITION; FRACTIONATION; HELIUM; HYDROGEN; NEPTUNE; NUMERICAL MODEL; PRESSURE EFFECT; SPECTRAL ANALYSIS; TEMPERATURE EFFECT;

ARTICLE; ASTRONOMY; ATMOSPHERE; CLOUD; MOLECULAR WEIGHT; PRIORITY JOURNAL; SPECTRUM; ULTRAVIOLET RADIATION; X RAY;

EID: 84892182871     PISSN: 00280836     EISSN: 14764687     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1038/nature12887     Document Type: Article

References (46)

1. Stevenson, K. B. et al. Possible thermochemical disequilibrium in the atmosphere of the exoplanet GJ 436b. Nature 464, 1161-1164 (2010).
2. Stevenson, K. B. et al. Two nearby sub-Earth-sized exoplanet candidates in the GJ 436b system. Astrophys. J. 755, 9 (2012).
3. Knutson, H. A. et al. A Spitzer transmission spectrum for the exoplanet GJ 436b, evidence for stellar variability, and constraints on dayside flux variations. Astrophys. J. 735, 27 (2011).
4. Madhusudhan, N. & Seager, S. High metallicity and non-equilibrium chemistry in the dayside atmosphere of hot-Neptune GJ 436b. Astrophys. J. 729, 41 (2011).
5. Line, M. R. et al. Thermochemical and photochemical kinetics in cooler hydrogendominated extrasolar planets: a methane-poor GJ 436b? Astrophys. J. 738, 32 (2011).
6. Moses, J. I. et al. Compositional diversity in the atmospheres of hot Neptunes, with application to GJ 436b. Astrophys. J. 777, 34 (2013).
7. Figueira, P. et al. Bulk composition of the transiting hot Neptune around GJ 436. Astron. Astrophys. 493, 671-676 (2009).
8. Nettelmann, N. et al. Interior structure models of GJ 436b. Astron. Astrophys. 523, A26 (2010).
9. Miller, N. & Fortney, J. J. The heavy element masses of extrasolar giant planets, revealed. Astrophys. J. 736, L29 (2011).
10. McCullough, P. M. & MacKenty, J. Considerations for using Spatial Scans with WFC3. Instrument Science Report WFC3 2012-8 (Space Telescope Science Institute, 2012).
11. Deming, D. et al. Infrared transmission spectroscopy of the exoplanets HD 209458b and XO-1b using the Wide Field Camera-3 on the Hubble Space Telescope. Astrophys. J. 774, 95 (2013).
12. Berta, Z. K. et al. The flat transmission spectrumof the super-Earth GJ 1214b from Wide Field Camera 3 on the Hubble Space Telescope. Astrophys. J. 747, 35 (2012).
13. Mandel, K. & Agol, E. Analytic light curves for planetary transit searches. Astrophys. J. 580, L171-L175 (2002).
14. Gillon, M. et al. Improved parameters for the transiting hot Jupiters WASP-4b and WASP-5b. Astron. Astrophys. 496, 259-267 (2009).
15. Carter, J. A. & Winn, J. N. Parameter estimation from time-series data with correlated errors: a wavelet-based method and its application to transit light curves. Astrophys. J. 704, 51-67 (2009).
16. Sing, D. K. et al. Hubble Space Telescope transmission spectroscopy of the exoplanet HD 189733b: high-altitude atmospheric haze in the optical and nearultraviolet with STIS. Mon. Not. R. Astron. Soc. 416, 1443-1455 (2011).
17. Pont, F. et al. The prevalence of dust on the exoplanet HD 189733b from Hubble and Spitzer observations. Mon. Not. R. Astron. Soc. 432, 2917-2944 (2013).
18. Benneke, B. & Seager, S. Atmospheric retrieval for super-Earth atmospheres: uniquely constraining the atmospheric composition with transmission spectroscopy. Astrophys. J. 753, 100 (2012).
19. Kreidberg, L. et al. Clouds in the atmosphere of the super-Earth exoplanet GJ1214b. Nature http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/nature12888 (this issue).
20. Morley, C. V. et al. Quantitatively assessing the role of clouds in the transmission spectrum of GJ 1214b. Astrophys. J. 775, 33 (2013).
21. Adams, E. R., Seager, S. & Elkins-Tanton, L. Ocean planet or thick atmosphere: on the mass-radius relationship for solid exoplanets with massive atmospheres. Astrophys. J. 673, 1160-1164 (2008).
22. Baraffe, I., Chabrier, G. & Barman, T. Structure and evolution of super-Earth to super-Jupiter exoplanets. I. Heavy element enrichment in the interior. Astron. Astrophys. 482, 315-332 (2008).
23. Rogers, L. A. & Seager, S. A framework for quantifying the degeneracies of exoplanet interior compositions. Astrophys. J. 712, 974-991 (2010).
24. Ehrenreich, D., Lecavelier des Etangs, A. & Delfosse, X. HST/STIS Lyman-a observations of the quiet M dwarf GJ 436. Astron. Astrophys. 529, A80 (2011).
25. Heng, K. & Kopparla, P. On the stability of super-Earth atmospheres. Astrophys. J. 754, 60 (2012).
26. Owen, J. E. & Jackson, A. P. Planetary evaporation by UV and X-ray radiation: basic hydrodynamics. Mon. Not. R. Astron. Soc. 425, 2931-2947 (2012).
27. Sanz-Forcada, J. et al. Estimation of the XUV radiation onto close planets and their evaporation. Astron. Astrophys. 532, A6 (2011).
28. Ehrenreich, D. & Désert, J.-M. Mass-loss rates for transiting exoplanets. Astron. Astrophys. 529, A136 (2011).
29. Fortney, J. J. et al. A framework for characterizing the atmospheres of low-mass low-density transiting planets. Astrophys. J. 775, 80 (2013).
30. Benneke, B. & Seager, S. How to distinguish between cloudy mini-Neptunes and water/volatile-dominated super-Earths. Astrophys. J. 778, 153 (2013).
31. Eastman, J., Siverd, R.&Gaudi, B. S. Achieving better than1 minute accuracy in the heliocentric and barycentric Julian dates. Proc. Astron. Soc. Pacific 122, 935-946 (2010).
32. Knutson, H. A. et al. Using stellar limb-darkening to refine the properties of HD 209458b. Astrophys. J. 655, 564 (2007).
33. Swain, M. R., Vasisht, G.&Tinetti, G. The presence of methane in the atmosphere of an extrasolar planet. Nature 452, 329-331 (2008).
34. Beaulieu, J. P. et al. Methane in the atmosphere of the transiting hot Neptune GJ 436b? Astrophys. J. 731, 16 (2011).
35. Hauschildt, P. et al. The NEXTGEN Model Atmosphere Grid. II. Spherically symmetric model atmospheres for giant stars with effective temperatures between 3000-6800 K. Astrophys. J. 525, 871-880 (1999).
36. Claret, A. A new non-linear limb-darkening law for LTE stellar atmosphere models. Astron. Astrophys. 363, 1081-1090 (2000).
37. von Braun, K. et al. The GJ 436 system: directly determined astrophysical parameters of an M dwarf and implications for the transiting hot Neptune. Astrophys. J. 753, 171 (2012).
38. Gregory, P. Bayesian Logical Data Analysis for the Physical Sciences 167 (Cambridge Univ. Press, 2005).
39. Bean, J. L. et al. A Hubble Space Telescope transit light curve for GJ 436b. Astron. Astrophys. 486, 1039-1046 (2008).
40. Coughlin, J. L. et al. New observations and a possible detection of parameter variations in the transits of Gliese 436b. Astrophys. J. 689, L149-L152 (2008).
41. Alonso, R. et al. Limits to the planet candidate GJ 436c. Astron. Astrophys. 487, L5-L8 (2008).
42. Pont, F. et al. Transit infrared spectroscopy of the hot Neptune around GJ 436 with the Hubble Space Telescope. Mon. Not. R. Astron. Soc. 393, L6-L10 (2009).
43. Shporer, A. et al. Photometric follow-up observations of the transiting Neptunemass planet GJ 436b. Astrophys. J. 694, 1559-1565 (2009).
44. Cáceres, C. et al. High cadence near infrared timing observations of extrasolar planets I. GJ 436b and XO-1b. Astron. Astrophys. 507, 481-486 (2009).
45. Ballard, S. et al. A search for additional planets in the NASA EPOXI observations of the exoplanet system GJ 436. Astrophys. J. 716, 1047-1059 (2010).
46. Knutson, H. A., Howard, A. W. & Isaacson, H. A correlation between stellar activity and hot Jupiter emission spectra. Astrophys. J. 720, 1569-1576 (2010).