347 research outputs found
Characterising exo-ringsystems around fast-rotating stars using the Rossiter-McLaughlin effect
Planetary rings produce a distinct shape distortion in transit lightcurves.
However, to accurately model such lightcurves the observations need to cover
the entire transit, especially ingress and egress, as well as an out-of-transit
baseline. Such observations can be challenging for long period planets, where
the transits may last for over a day. Planetary rings will also impact the
shape of absorption lines in the stellar spectrum, as the planet and rings
cover different parts of the rotating star (the Rossiter-McLaughlin effect).
These line-profile distortions depend on the size, structure, opacity,
obliquity and sky projected angle of the ring system. For slow rotating stars,
this mainly impacts the amplitude of the induced velocity shift, however, for
fast rotating stars the large velocity gradient across the star allows the line
distortion to be resolved, enabling direct determination of the ring
parameters. We demonstrate that by modeling these distortions we can recover
ring system parameters (sky-projected angle, obliquity and size) using only a
small part of the transit. Substructure in the rings, e.g. gaps, can be
recovered if the width of the features () relative to the size of the
star is similar to the intrinsic velocity resolution (set by the width of the
local stellar profile, ) relative to the stellar rotation velocity (
sin, i.e. sin/). This opens up a new
way to study the ring systems around planets with long orbital periods, where
observations of the full transit, covering the ingress and egress, are not
always feasible.Comment: Accepted for publication in MNRA
Detection of water absorption in the day side atmosphere of HD 189733 b using ground-based high-resolution spectroscopy at 3.2 microns
We report a 4.8 sigma detection of water absorption features in the day side
spectrum of the hot Jupiter HD 189733 b. We used high-resolution (R~100,000)
spectra taken at 3.2 microns with CRIRES on the VLT to trace the
radial-velocity shift of the water features in the planet's day side atmosphere
during 5 h of its 2.2 d orbit as it approached secondary eclipse. Despite
considerable telluric contamination in this wavelength regime, we detect the
signal within our uncertainties at the expected combination of systemic
velocity (Vsys=-3 +5-6 km/s) and planet orbital velocity (Kp=154 +14-10 km/s),
and determine a H2O line contrast ratio of (1.3+/-0.2)x10^-3 with respect to
the stellar continuum. We find no evidence of significant absorption or
emission from other carbon-bearing molecules, such as methane, although we do
note a marginal increase in the significance of our detection to 5.1 sigma with
the inclusion of carbon dioxide in our template spectrum. This result
demonstrates that ground-based, high-resolution spectroscopy is suited to
finding not just simple molecules like CO, but also to more complex molecules
like H2O even in highly telluric contaminated regions of the Earth's
transmission spectrum. It is a powerful tool that can be used for conducting an
immediate census of the carbon- and oxygen-bearing molecules in the atmospheres
of giant planets, and will potentially allow the formation and migration
history of these planets to be constrained by the measurement of their
atmospheric C/O ratios.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figures, accepted for publication in MNRAS Letter
The GROUSE project III: Ks-band observations of the thermal emission from WASP-33b
In recent years, day-side emission from about a dozen hot Jupiters has been
detected through ground-based secondary eclipse observations in the
near-infrared. These near-infrared observations are vital for determining the
energy budgets of hot Jupiters, since they probe the planet's spectral energy
distribution near its peak. The aim of this work is to measure the Ks-band
secondary eclipse depth of WASP-33b, the first planet discovered to transit an
A-type star. This planet receives the highest level of irradiation of all
transiting planets discovered to date. Furthermore, its host-star shows
pulsations and is classified as a low-amplitude delta-Scuti. As part of our
GROUnd-based Secondary Eclipse (GROUSE) project we have obtained observations
of two separate secondary eclipses of WASP-33b in the Ks-band using the LIRIS
instrument on the William Herschel Telescope (WHT). The telescope was
significantly defocused to avoid saturation of the detector for this bright
star (K~7.5). To increase the stability and the cadence of the observations,
they were performed in staring mode. We collected a total of 5100 and 6900
frames for the first and the second night respectively, both with an average
cadence of 3.3 seconds. On the second night the eclipse is detected at the
12-sigma level, with a measured eclipse depth of 0.244+0.027-0.020 %. This
eclipse depth corresponds to a brightness temperature of 3270+115-160 K. The
measured brightness temperature on the second night is consistent with the
expected equilibrium temperature for a planet with a very low albedo and a
rapid re-radiation of the absorbed stellar light. For the other night the short
out-of-eclipse baseline prevents good corrections for the stellar pulsations
and systematic effects, which makes this dataset unreliable for eclipse depth
measurements. This demonstrates the need of getting a sufficient out-of-eclipse
baseline.Comment: 12 pages, 10 figures. Accepted for publication in Astronomy and
Astrophysic
The Changing Face of α Centauri B: Probing plage and stellar activity in K-dwarfs
A detailed knowledge of stellar activity is crucial for understanding stellar
dynamos, as well as pushing exoplanet radial-velocity detection limits towards
Earth analogue confirmation. We directly compare archival HARPS spectra taken
at the minimum in Cen B's activity cycle to a high-activity state when
clear rotational modulation of is visible. Relative to the
inactive spectra, we find a large number of narrow pseudo-emission features in
the active spectra with strengths that are rotationally modulated. These
features most likely originate from plage, spots, or a combination of both.
They also display radial velocity variations of 300 m s -
consistent with an active region rotating across the stellar surface.
Furthermore, we see evidence that some of the lines originating from the
`active immaculate' photosphere appear broader relative to the `inactive
immaculate' case. This may be due to enhanced contributions of e.g. magnetic
bright points to these lines, which then causes additional line broadening.
More detailed analysis may enable measurements of plage and spot coverage using
single spectra in the future.Comment: 6 pages, 4 figures, accepted for publication in Monthly Notices of
the Royal Astronomical Society (MNRAS) Letter
The GROUSE project II: Detection of the Ks-band secondary eclipse of exoplanet HAT-P-1b
Context: Only recently it has become possible to measure the thermal emission
from hot-Jupiters at near-Infrared wavelengths using ground-based telescopes,
by secondary eclipse observations. This allows the planet flux to be probed
around the peak of its spectral energy distribution, which is vital for the
understanding of its energy budget. Aims: The aim of the reported work is to
measure the eclipse depth of the planet HAT-P-1b at 2.2micron. This planet is
an interesting case, since the amount of stellar irradiation it receives falls
in between that of the two best studied systems (HD209458 and HD189733), and it
has been suggested to have a weak thermal inversion layer. Methods: We have
used the LIRIS instrument on the William Herschel Telescope (WHT) to observe
the secondary eclipse of HATP-1b in the Ks-band, as part of our Ground-based
secondary eclipse (GROUSE) project. The observations were done in staring mode,
while significantly defocusing the telescope to avoid saturation on the K=8.4
star. With an average cadence of 2.5 seconds, we collected 6520 frames during
one night. Results: The eclipse is detected at the 4sigma level, the measured
depth being 0.109+/-0.025%. The uncertainties are dominated by residual
systematic effects, as estimated from different reduction/analysis procedures.
The measured depth corresponds to a brightness temperature of 2136+150-170K.
This brightness temperature is significantly higher than those derived from
longer wavelengths, making it difficult to fit all available data points with a
plausible atmospheric model. However, it may be that we underestimate the true
uncertainties of our measurements, since it is notoriously difficult to assign
precise statistical significance to a result when systematic effects are
important.Comment: 7 pages, 10 figures, Accepted for publication in A&
Doppler tomography as a tool for detecting exoplanet atmospheres
High-resolution Doppler spectroscopy is a powerful tool for identifying molecular species in the atmospheres of both transiting and non-transiting exoplanets. Currently, such data is analysed using cross-correlation techniques to detect the Doppler shifting signal from the orbiting planet. In this paper we demonstrate that, compared to cross-correlation methods currently used, the technique of Doppler tomography has improved sensitivity in detecting the subtle signatures expected from exoplanet atmospheres. This is partly due to the use of a regularizing statistic, which acts to suppress noise, coupled to the fact that all the data is fit simultaneously. In addition, we show that the technique can also effectively suppress contanimating spectral features that may arise due to overlapping lines, repeating line patterns, or the use of incorrect linelists. These issues can confuse conventional cross-correlation approaches, primarily due to aliasing issues inherent in such techniques, whereas Doppler tomography is less susceptible to such effects. In particular, Doppler tomography shows exceptional promise for simultaneously detecting multiple line species (e.g. isotopologues), even when there are high contrasts between such species – and far outperforms current CCF analyses in this respect. Finally, we demonstrate that Doppler tomography is capable of recovering molecular signals from exoplanets using real data, by confirming the strong detection of CO in the atmosphere of τ Boo b. We recover a signal with a planetary radial velocity semi-amplitude Kp = 109.6 ± 2.2 km s−1, in excellent agreement with the previously reported value of 110.0 ± 3.2 km s−1
Electronic structure of superposition states in flux qubits
Flux qubits, small superconducting loops interrupted by Josephson junctions,
are successful realizations of quantum coherence for macroscopic variables.
Superconductivity in these loops is carried by --
electrons, which has been interpreted as suggesting that coherent
superpositions of such current states are macroscopic superpositions analogous
to Schr\"odinger's cat. We provide a full microscopic analysis of such qubits,
from which the macroscopic quantum description can be derived. This reveals
that the number of microscopic constituents participating in superposition
states for experimentally accessible flux qubits is surprisingly but not
trivially small. The combination of this relatively small size with large
differences between macroscopic observables in the two branches is seen to
result from the Fermi statistics of the electrons and the large disparity
between the values of superfluid and Fermi velocity in these systems.Comment: Minor cosmetic changes. Published version
Translational model of melphalan-induced gut toxicity reveals drug-host-microbe interactions that drive tissue injury and fever
Published: 20 April 2021PURPOSE: Conditioning therapy with high-dose melphalan (HDM) is associated with a high risk of gut toxicity, fever and infections in haematopoietic stem cell transplant (HSCT) recipients. However, validated preclinical models that adequately reflect clinical features of melphalan-induced toxicity are not available. We therefore aimed to develop a novel preclinical model of melphalan-induced toxicity that reflected well-defined clinical dynamics, as well as to identify targetable mechanisms that drive intestinal injury. METHODS: Male Wistar rats were treated with 4-8 mg/kg melphalan intravenously. The primary endpoint was plasma citrulline. Secondary endpoints included survival, weight loss, diarrhea, food/water intake, histopathology, body temperature, microbiota composition (16S sequencing) and bacterial translocation. RESULTS: Melphalan 5 mg/kg caused self-limiting intestinal injury, severe neutropenia and fever while impairing the microbial metabolome, prompting expansion of enteric pathogens. Intestinal inflammation was characterized by infiltration of polymorphic nuclear cells in the acute phases of mucosal injury, driving derangement of intestinal architecture. Ileal atrophy prevented bile acid reabsorption, exacerbating colonic injury via microbiota-dependent mechanisms. CONCLUSION: We developed a novel translational model of melphalan-induced toxicity, which has excellent homology with the well-known clinical features of HDM transplantation. Application of this model will accelerate fundamental and translational study of melphalan-induced toxicity, with the clinical parallels of this model ensuring a greater likelihood of clinical success.H. R. Wardill, C. E. M. de Mooij, A. R. da Silva Ferreira, I. P. van de Peppel, R. Havinga, H. J. M. Harmsen ... et al
Ground-based detection of sodium in the transmission spectrum of exoplanet HD209458b
[Context] The first detection of an atmosphere around an extrasolar planet
was presented by Charbonneau and collaborators in 2002. In the optical
transmission spectrum of the transiting exoplanet HD209458b, an absorption
signal from sodium was measured at a level of 0.023+-0.006%, using the STIS
spectrograph on the Hubble Space Telescope. Despite several attempts, so far
only upper limits to the Na D absorption have been obtained using telescopes
from the ground, and the HST result has yet to be confirmed.
[Aims] The aims of this paper are to re-analyse data taken with the High
Dispersion Spectrograph on the Subaru telescope, to correct for systematic
effects dominating the data quality, and to improve on previous results
presented in the literature.
[Methods] The data reduction process was altered in several places, most
importantly allowing for small shifts in the wavelength solution. The relative
depth of all lines in the spectra, including the two sodium D lines, are found
to correlate strongly with the continuum count level in the spectra. These
variations are attributed to non-linearity effects in the CCDs. After removal
of this empirical relation the uncertainties in the line depths are only a
fraction above that expected from photon statistics.
[Results] The sodium absorption due to the planet's atmosphere is detected at
>5 sigma, at a level of 0.056+-0.007% (2x3.0 Ang band), 0.070+-0.011% (2x1.5
Ang band), and 0.135+-0.017% (2x0.75 Ang band). There is no evidence that the
planetary absorption signal is shifted with respect to the stellar absorption,
as recently claimed for HD189733b. The measurements in the two most narrow
bands indicate that some signal is being resolved.[abridged]Comment: Latex, 7 pages: accepted for publication in Astronomy & Astrophysic
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