Prof Suzanne Aigrain

Abstract:

As radial velocity (RV) spectrographs reach unprecedented precision and stability below 1 m s, the challenge of granulation in the context of exoplanet detection has intensified. Despite promising advancements in post-processing tools, granulation remains a significant concern for the EPRV (extremely precise radial velocity) community. We present a pilot study to detect and characterize granulation using the High-Accuracy Radial-velocity Planet Searcher for the Northern hemisphere (HARPS-N) spectrograph. We observed HD 166620, a K2 star in the Maunder Minimum phase, intensely for two successive nights, expecting granulation to be the dominant nightly noise source in the absence of strong magnetic activity. After correcting for a newly identified instrumental signature, originating from CCD illumination variations under optimal seeing conditions, we detected the granulation signal using structure-function (SF) analysis and a single-component Gaussian process (GP) model. The granulation signal has a characteristic time-scale of min, within 1, and a standard deviation of cm s, within 3 of the predicted value. By examining spectra and RVs as a function of line formation temperature, we investigated the sensitivity of granulation-induced RV variations across different photospheric layers. We extracted RVs from various photospheric depths using both the line-by-line and cross-correlation function methods to mitigate any extraction method biases. Our findings indicate that granulation variability is detectable in both temperature bins, with the cooler bins, corresponding to the shallower layers of the photosphere, aligning more closely with predicted values.

Abstract:

Thedistribution of close-in exoplanets is shaped by a complex interplay betweenatmospheric and dynamical processes. The Desert, Ridge, and Savanna(respectively a lack, overoccurence, and mild deficit of Neptunes withincreasing periods) illustrate the sensitivity of these worlds to suchprocesses, making them ideal targets to disentangle their roles. Determininghow many Neptunes are brought close-in by early disk-driven migration (DDM;expected to maintain primordial spin-orbit alignment) or late high-eccentricitytidal migration (HEM; expected to generate large misalignments) is essential tounderstanding how much atmosphere they lost. In this paper, we propose aunified view of the exo-Neptunian landscape to guide its exploration andspeculate that the Ridge is a hot spot for evolutionary processes. Low-densityNeptunes would mainly undergo DDM, becoming fully eroded at shorter periodsthan the Ridge. This is in contrast to denser Neptunes, which would be broughtto the Ridge and Desert by HEM. We embark on this exploration via the ATREIDES(Ancestry, Traits, and Relations of Exoplanets Inhabiting the Desert Edges andSavanna) collaboration, which relies on spectroscopic and photometricobservations of ~60 close-in Neptunes, their reduction with robust pipelines,and their interpretation through internal structure, atmospheric, andevolutionary models. We carried out a systematic Rossiter-McLaughlin censuswith VLT/ESPRESSO to measure the distribution of 3D spin-orbit angles,correlate its shape with the system properties (orbit, density, evaporation),and thus relate the fraction of aligned-misaligned Neptunian systems to DDM,HEM, and atmospheric erosion. The first ATREIDES target, TOI-421 c, lies in theSavanna with a neighboring sub-Neptune TOI-421 b. We measured for the firsttime their 3D spin-orbit angles (ψb = 57−15+11∘; ψc = 44.9−4.1+4.4∘). Together with the eccentricity and possibly large mutualinclination of their orbits, this hints at a chaotic dynamical origin thatcould result from DDM followed by HEM. Our program will provide the communitywith a wealth of constraints for formation and evolution models, and we welcomecollaborations that will contribute to pushing our understanding of theexo-Neptunian landscape forward.

Abstract:

Abstract Doppler Imaging (DI) is a well-established technique to map a physical field at a stellar surface from a time series of high-resolution spectra. In this proof-of-concept study, we aim to show that traditional DI algorithms, originally designed for rapidly-rotating stars, have also the ability to model the activity of Sun-like stars, when observed with new-generation highly-stable spectrographs, and search for low-mass planets around them. We used DI to retrieve the relative brightness distribution at the surface of the Sun from radial velocity (RV) observations collected by HARPS-N between 2022 and 2024. The brightness maps obtained with DI have a typical angular resolution of ~36○ and are a good match to low-resolution disc-resolved Dopplergrams of the Sun at epochs when the absolute, disc-integrated RV exceeds ~2 m s−1. The RV residuals after DI correction exhibit a dispersion of about 0.6 m s−1, comparable with existing state-of-the-art activity correction techniques. Using planet injection-recovery tests, we also show that DI can be a powerful tool for blind planet searches, so long as the orbital period is larger than ~100 days (i.e. 3 to 4 stellar rotation periods), and that it yields planetary mass estimates with an accuracy comparable to, for example, multi-dimensional Gaussian process regression. Finally, we highlight some limitations of traditional DI algorithms, which should be addressed to make DI a reliable alternative to state-of-the-art RV-based planet search techniques.