Prof Suzanne Aigrain

Abstract:

We report the discovery by the CoRoT space mission of a new giant planet, CoRoT-20b. The planet has a mass of 4.24 ± 0.23 MJup and a radius of 0.84 ± 0.04 RJup. With a mean density of 8.87 ± 1.10 g cm-3, it is among the most compact planets known so far. Evolutionary models for the planet suggest a mass of heavy elements of the order of 800 M⊕ if embedded in a central core, requiring a revision either of the planet formation models or both planet evolution and structure models. We note however that smaller amounts of heavy elements are expected by more realistic models in which they are mixed throughout the envelope. The planet orbits a G-type star with an orbital period of 9.24 days and an eccentricity of 0.56.The star's projected rotational velocity is vsini = 4.5 ± 1.0 km s-1, corresponding to a spin period of 11.5 ± 3.1 days if its axis of rotation is perpendicular to the orbital plane. In the framework of Darwinian theories and neglecting stellar magnetic breaking, we calculate the tidal evolution of the system and show that CoRoT-20b is presently one of the very few Darwin-stable planets that is evolving toward a triple synchronous state with equality of the orbital, planetary and stellar spin periods. © 2012 ESO.

Abstract:

Context. CoRoT is a pioneering space mission whose primary goals are stellar seismology and extrasolar planets search. Its surveys of large stellar fields generate numerous planetary candidates whose lightcurves have transit-like features. An extensive analytical and observational follow-up effort is undertaken to classify these candidates. Aims. We present the list of planetary transit candidates from the CoRoT LRa01 star field in the Monoceros constellation toward the Galactic anti-center direction. The CoRoT observations of LRa01 lasted from 24 October 2007 to 3 March 2008. Methods. We acquired and analyzed 7470 chromatic and 3938 monochromatic lightcurves. Instrumental noise and stellar variability were treated with several filtering tools by different teams from the CoRoT community. Different transit search algorithms were applied to the lightcurves. Results. Fifty-one stars were classified as planetary transit candidates in LRa01. Thirty-seven (i.e., 73% of all candidates) are "good" planetary candidates based on photometric analysis only. Thirty-two (i.e., 87% of the "good" candidates) have been followed-up. At the time of writing twenty-two cases were solved and five planets were discovered: three transiting hot-Jupiters (CoRoT-5b, CoRoT-12b, and CoRoT-21b), the first terrestrial transiting planet (CoRoT-7b), and another planet in the same system (CoRoT-7c, detected by radial velocity survey only). Evidence of another non-transiting planet in the CoRoT-7 system, namely CoRoT-7d, was recently found as well. © 2012 ESO.

Abstract:

The detection and characterization of the first transiting super-Earth, CoRoT-7b, has required an unprecedented effort in terms of telescope time and analysis. Although the star does display a radial-velocity signal at the period of the planet, this has been difficult to disentangle from the intrinsic stellar variability and pinning down the velocity amplitude has been very challenging. As a result, the precise value of the mass of the planet - and even the extent to which it can be considered to be confirmed - has been debated in the recent literature, with six mass measurements published so far based on the same spectroscopic observations, ranging from about 2 to 8 Earth masses. Here we report on an independent validation of the planet discovery using one of the fundamental properties of a transit signal: its achromaticity. We observed four transits of CoRoT-7b at 4.5μm and 8.0μm with the Infrared Array Camera (IRAC) on board the Spitzer Space Telescope in order to determine whether the depth of the transit signal in the near-infrared is consistent with that observed in the CoRoT bandpass, as expected for a planet. We detected the transit and found an average depth of 0.426± 0.115mmag at 4.5μm, which is in good agreement with the depth of 0.350 ± 0.011mmag (ignoring limb darkening) found by CoRoT. The observations at 8.0μm did not yield a significant detection. The 4.5μm observations place important constraints on the kinds of astrophysical false positives that could mimic the signal. Combining this with additional constraints reported earlier, we performed an exhaustive exploration of possible blend scenarios for CoRoT-7b using the BLENDER technique. We are able to rule out the vast majority of false positives, and the remaining ones are found to be much less likely than a true transiting planet. We thus validate CoRoT-7b as a bona fide planet with a very high degree of confidence, independently of any radial-velocity information. Our Spitzer observations have additionally allowed us to significantly improve the ephemeris of the planet, so that future transits should be recoverable well into the next decade. In its warm phase Spitzer is expected to be an essential tool for the validation, along the lines of the present analysis, of transiting planet candidates with shallow signals from CoRoT as well as from the Kepler mission, including potentially rocky planets in the habitable zones of their parent stars. © 2012. The American Astronomical Society. All rights reserved.