83 research outputs found
A Search for Multi-Planet Systems Using the Hobby-Eberly Telescope
Extrasolar multiple-planet systems provide valuable opportunities for testing
theories of planet formation and evolution. The architectures of the known
multiple-planet systems demonstrate a fascinating level of diversity, which
motivates the search for additional examples of such systems in order to better
constrain their formation and dynamical histories. Here we describe a
comprehensive investigation of 22 planetary systems in an effort to answer
three questions: 1) Are there additional planets? 2) Where could additional
planets reside in stable orbits? and 3) What limits can these observations
place on such objects? We find no evidence for additional bodies in any of
these systems; indeed, these new data do not support three previously announced
planets (HD 20367b: Udry et al. 2003, HD 74156d: Bean et al. 2008, and 47 UMa
c: Fischer et al. 2002). The dynamical simulations show that nearly all of the
22 systems have large regions in which additional planets could exist in stable
orbits. The detection-limit computations indicate that this study is sensitive
to close-in Neptune-mass planets for most of the systems targeted. We conclude
with a discussion on the implications of these non-detections.Comment: Accepted to ApJS. Includes 39 pages of radial-velocity data table
A Hot Uranus Orbiting the Super Metal-rich Star HD77338 and the Metallicity - Mass Connection
We announce the discovery of a low-mass planet orbiting the super metal-rich
K0V star HD77338 as part of our on-going Calan-Hertfordshire Extrasolar Planet
Search. The best fit planet solution has an orbital period of 5.7361\pm0.0015
days and with a radial velocity semi-amplitude of only 5.96\pm1.74 m/s, we find
a minimum mass of 15.9+4.7-5.3 Me. The best fit eccentricity from this solution
is 0.09+0.25-0.09, and we find agreement for this data set using a Bayesian
analysis and a periodogram analysis. We measure a metallicity for the star of
+0.35\pm0.06 dex, whereas another recent work (Trevisan et al. 2011) finds
+0.47\pm0.05 dex. Thus HD77338b is one of the most metal-rich planet host stars
known and the most metal-rich star hosting a sub-Neptune mass planet. We
searched for a transit signature of HD77338b but none was detected. We also
highlight an emerging trend where metallicity and mass seem to correlate at
very low masses, a discovery that would be in agreement with the core accretion
model of planet formation. The trend appears to show that for Neptune-mass
planets and below, higher masses are preferred when the host star is more
metal-rich. Also a lower boundary is apparent in the super metal-rich regime
where there are no very low-mass planets yet discovered in comparison to the
sub-solar metallicity regime. A Monte Carlo analysis shows that this, low-mass
planet desert, is statistically significant with the current sample of 36
planets at around the 4.5\sigma\ level. In addition, results from Kepler
strengthen the claim for this paucity of the lowest-mass planets in super
metal-rich systems. Finally, this discovery adds to the growing population of
low-mass planets around low-mass and metal-rich stars and shows that very
low-mass planets can now be discovered with a relatively small number of data
points using stable instrumentation.Comment: 25 pages, 15 figures, 5 tables, accepted for publication in Ap
Mapping the Shores of the Brown Dwarf Desert III: Young Moving Groups
We present the results of an aperture masking interferometry survey for
substellar companions around 67 members of the young (~8-200Myr) nearby
(~5-86pc) AB Doradus, Beta Pictoris, Hercules-Lyra, TW Hya, and
Tucana-Horologium stellar associations. Observations were made at near infrared
wavelengths between 1.2-3.8 microns using the adaptive optics facilities of the
Keck II, VLT UT4, and Palomar Hale Telescopes. Typical contrast ratios of
~100-200 were achieved at angular separations between ~40-320mas, with our
survey being 100% complete for companions with masses below 0.25\msolar across
this range. We report the discovery of a \msolar companion to
HIP14807, as well as the detections and orbits of previously known stellar
companions to HD16760, HD113449, and HD160934. We show that the companion to
HD16760 is in a face-on orbit, resulting in an upward revision of its mass from
\mjupiter to \msolar. No substellar
companions were detected around any of our sample members, despite our ability
to detect companions with masses below 80\mjupiter for 50 of our targets: of
these, our sensitivity extended down to 40\mjupiter around 30 targets, with a
subset of 22 subject to the still more stringent limit of 20\mjupiter. A
statistical analysis of our non-detection of substellar companions allows us to
place constraints on their frequency around ~0.2-1.5\msolar stars. In
particular, considering companion mass distributions that have been proposed in
the literature, we obtain an upper limit estimate of ~9-11% for the frequency
of 20-80\mjupiter companions between 3-30AU at 95% confidence, assuming that
their semimajor axes are distributed according to in this range.Comment: Accepted by Ap
A maximum entropy approach to detect close-in giant planets around active stars
Context: The high spot coverage of young active stars is responsible for distortions of spectral lines that hamper the detection of close-in planets through radial velocity methods.
Aims: We aim to progress towards more efficient exoplanet detection around active stars by optimizing the use of Doppler imaging in radial velocity measurements.
Methods: We propose a simple method to simultaneously extract a brightness map and a set of orbital parameters through a tomographic inversion technique derived from classical Doppler mapping. Based on the maximum entropy principle, the underlying idea is to determine the set of orbital parameters that minimizes the information content of the resulting Doppler map. We carry out a set of numerical simulations to perform a preliminary assessment of the robustness of our method, using an actual Doppler map of the very active star HR 1099 to produce a realistic synthetic data set for various sets of orbital parameters of a single planet in a circular orbit.
Results: Using a simulated time series of 50 line profiles affected by a peak-to-peak activity jitter of 2.5 km s, in most cases we are able to recover the radial velocity amplitude, orbital phase, and orbital period of an artificial planet down to a radial velocity semi-amplitude of the order of the radial velocity scatter due to the photon noise alone (about 50 m s in our case). One noticeable exception occurs when the planetary orbit is close to co-rotation, in which case significant biases are observed in the reconstructed radial velocity amplitude, while the orbital period and phase remain robustly recovered.
Conclusions: The present method constitutes a very simple way to extract orbital parameters from heavily distorted line profiles of active stars, when more classical radial velocity detection methods generally fail. It is easily adaptable to most existing Doppler imaging codes, paving the way towards a systematic search for close-in planets orbiting young, rapidly-rotating stars
Fifteen new risk loci for coronary artery disease highlight arterial-wall-specific mechanisms
Coronary artery disease (CAD) is a leading cause of morbidity and mortality worldwide. Although 58 genomic regions have been associated with CAD thus far, most of the heritability is unexplained, indicating that additional susceptibility loci await identification. An efficient discovery strategy may be larger-scale evaluation of promising associations suggested by genome-wide association studies (GWAS). Hence, we genotyped 56,309 participants using a targeted gene array derived from earlier GWAS results and performed meta-analysis of results with 194,427 participants previously genotyped, totaling 88,192 CAD cases and 162,544 controls. We identified 25 new SNP-CAD associations (P < 5 × 10(-8), in fixed-effects meta-analysis) from 15 genomic regions, including SNPs in or near genes involved in cellular adhesion, leukocyte migration and atherosclerosis (PECAM1, rs1867624), coagulation and inflammation (PROCR, rs867186 (p.Ser219Gly)) and vascular smooth muscle cell differentiation (LMOD1, rs2820315). Correlation of these regions with cell-type-specific gene expression and plasma protein levels sheds light on potential disease mechanisms
Recommended from our members
Impact of Common Variation in Bone-Related Genes on Type 2 Diabetes and Related Traits
Exploring genetic pleiotropy can provide clues to a mechanism underlying the observed epidemiological association between type 2 diabetes and heightened fracture risk. We examined genetic variants associated with bone mineral density (BMD) for association with type 2 diabetes and glycemic traits in large well-phenotyped and -genotyped consortia. We undertook follow-up analysis in ∼19,000 individuals and assessed gene expression. We queried single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) associated with BMD at levels of genome-wide significance, variants in linkage disequilibrium (r2 > 0.5), and BMD candidate genes. SNP rs6867040, at the ITGA1 locus, was associated with a 0.0166 mmol/L (0.004) increase in fasting glucose per C allele in the combined analysis. Genetic variants in the ITGA1 locus were associated with its expression in the liver but not in adipose tissue. ITGA1 variants appeared among the top loci associated with type 2 diabetes, fasting insulin, β-cell function by homeostasis model assessment, and 2-h post–oral glucose tolerance test glucose and insulin levels. ITGA1 has demonstrated genetic pleiotropy in prior studies, and its suggested role in liver fibrosis, insulin secretion, and bone healing lends credence to its contribution to both osteoporosis and type 2 diabetes. These findings further underscore the link between skeletal and glucose metabolism and highlight a locus to direct future investigations
The medical student
The Medical Student was published from 1888-1921 by the students of Boston University School of Medicine
Transit Timing Observations from Kepler: IV. Confirmation of 4 Multiple Planet Systems by Simple Physical Models
Eighty planetary systems of two or more planets are known to orbit stars
other than the Sun. For most, the data can be sufficiently explained by
non-interacting Keplerian orbits, so the dynamical interactions of these
systems have not been observed. Here we present 4 sets of lightcurves from the
Kepler spacecraft, which each show multiple planets transiting the same star.
Departure of the timing of these transits from strict periodicity indicates the
planets are perturbing each other: the observed timing variations match the
forcing frequency of the other planet. This confirms that these objects are in
the same system. Next we limit their masses to the planetary regime by
requiring the system remain stable for astronomical timescales. Finally, we
report dynamical fits to the transit times, yielding possible values for the
planets' masses and eccentricities. As the timespan of timing data increases,
dynamical fits may allow detailed constraints on the systems' architectures,
even in cases for which high-precision Doppler follow-up is impractical.Comment: In the proofs process, corrections were made to tables -- most
crucially, the timing data for Kepler-30b and the depths and radii of planets
in Kepler-31 and 3
The habitability of Proxima Centauri b I. Irradiation, rotation and volatile inventory from formation to the present
International audienceProxima b is a planet with a minimum mass of 1.3 MEarth orbiting within the habitable zone (HZ) of Proxima Centauri, a very low-mass, active star and the Sun's closest neighbor. Here we investigate a number of factors related to the potential habitability of Proxima b and its ability to maintain liquid water on its surface. We set the stage by estimating the current high-energy irradiance of the planet and show that the planet currently receives 30 times more EUV radiation than Earth and 250 times more X-rays. We compute the time evolution of the star's spectrum, which is essential for modeling the flux received over Proxima b's lifetime. We also show that Proxima b's obliquity is likely null and its spin is either synchronous or in a 3:2 spin-orbit resonance, depending on the planet's eccentricity and level of triaxiality. Next we consider the evolution of Proxima b's water inventory. We use our spectral energy distribution to compute the hydrogen loss from the planet with an improved energy-limited escape formalism. Despite the high level of stellar activity we find that Proxima b is likely to have lost less than an Earth ocean's worth of hydrogen before it reached the HZ 100-200 Myr after its formation. The largest uncertainty in our work is the initial water budget, which is not constrained by planet formation models. We conclude that Proxima b is a viable candidate habitable planet
- …