The Interior Structure, Composition, and Evolution of Giant Planets

By Jon Fortney, N. Nettelmann. 2009

280 citations recorded by the source corpus.

We discuss our current understanding of the interior structure and thermal evolution of giant planets. This includes the gas giants, such as Jupiter and Saturn, that are primarily composed of hydrogen and helium, as well as the “ice giants,” such as Uranus and Neptune, which are primarily composed of elements heavier than H/He. The effect of different hydrogen equations of state (including new first-principles computations) on Jupiter’s core mass and heavy element distribution is detailed. This variety of the hydrogen equations of state translate into an uncertainty in Jupiter’s core mass of 18M⊕. For Uranus and Neptune we find deep envelope metallicities up to 0.95, perhaps indicating the existence of an eroded core, as also supported by their low luminosity. We discuss the results of simple cooling models of our solar system’s planets, and show that more complex thermal evolution models may be necessary to understand their cooling history. We review how measurements of the masses and radii of the nearly 50 transiting extrasolar giant planets are changing our understanding of giant planets. In particular a fraction of these planets appear to be larger than can be accommodated by standard models of planetary contraction. We review the proposed explanations for the radii of these planets. We also discuss very young giant planets, which are being directly imaged with ground- and space-based telescopes.

Subfields: Astronomy and Astrophysics, Instrumentation, Statistical and Nonlinear Physics

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/738248f91688b0607ad405d9d3db789187891e29

How researchers see this paper

The researchers whose trusted networks rank it highest, strongest advocate first. Every researcher gets a different order.

In Astronomy and Astrophysics

1. Jon Fortney
2. D. Charbonneau
3. J. Winn
4. Sara Seager
5. J. Johnson
6. Timothy Morton
7. C. Mordasini
8. G. Marcy

In Instrumentation

1. Jon Fortney
2. D. Charbonneau
3. J. Winn
4. Timothy Morton
5. Sara Seager
6. J. Johnson
7. G. Marcy
8. J. Southworth

In Statistical and Nonlinear Physics

1. Jon Fortney
2. C. Mordasini
3. E. Lopez
4. Sara Seager
5. Th. Henning
6. N. Nettelmann
7. D. Charbonneau
8. T. Guillot

Citations in the corpus

• Characterization of exoplanets from their formation - II. The planetary mass-radius relationship (2012, background): “The reader is referred to Fortney & Nettelmann (2010) or Baraffe et al. (2010) for recent reviews.”
• IMPROVED SPECTROSCOPIC PARAMETERS FOR TRANSITING PLANET HOSTS (2012, background): “A variety of mechanisms have been proposed that may play a role in " puffing up " the planets, but no universal process seems to account for all of these anomalies (see, e.g., Burrows et al. 2007; Miller et al. 2009; Fortney & Nettelmann 2010; Demory & Seager 2011, and references therein).”
• The phase diagram of water and the magnetic fields of Uranus and Neptune (2011, methodology): “Recent homogeneous evolution calculations (Fortney and Nettelmann, 2010) of Uranus and Neptune based on the same EOS data as used in this work confirm previous results for Uranus, while for Neptune the cooling time has improved to about 5.”
• THE MASS–METALLICITY RELATION FOR GIANT PLANETS (2015, background): “A thorough discussion is outside the scope of this article, but the various proposed inflation mechanisms are extensively reviewed in Fortney & Nettelmann (2010), Baraffe et al. (2014), and Weiss et al. (2013).”
• KEPLER-18b, c, AND d: A SYSTEM OF THREE PLANETS CONFIRMED BY TRANSIT TIMING VARIATIONS, LIGHT CURVE VALIDATION, WARM-SPITZER PHOTOMETRY, AND RADIAL VELOCITY MEASUREMENTS (2011, background): “Uranus and Neptune are ∼ 80-90% heavy elements (e.g., water and rock) by mass (Fortney & Nettelmann 2010), while below we show that the heavy element mass fractions of Kepler-18c and Kepler-18d are somewhat lower than these values.”
• A new vision of giant planet interiors: Impact of double diffusive convection (2012, background): “All the present determinations of the internal - chemical, mechanical and thermal - structures of the Solar system planets, including their heavy material content, are derived assuming such homogeneously stratified, adiabatic interiors (Saumon & Guillot 2004; Fortney & Nettelmann 2010).”
• New indication for a dichotomy in the interior structure of Uranus and Neptune from the application of modified shape and rotation data (2012, methodology): “Structure models of Uranus and Neptune are generally in agreement in predicting a small rock core, a deep interior of more than 70% heavy elements, and a significantly less enriched outer envelope with a transition at about 70% of the radius for both planets (Hubbard et al., 1995; Fortney and Nettel”
• THE HEAVY-ELEMENT MASSES OF EXTRASOLAR GIANT PLANETS, REVEALED (2011, background): “On the other hand, the heavy element enrichment decreases with increasing planet mass consistent with the pattern found in the solar system’s four giant planets (Fortney & Nettelmann 2010).”
• LACK OF INFLATED RADII FOR KEPLER GIANT PLANET CANDIDATES RECEIVING MODEST STELLAR IRRADIATION (2011, background): “Despite numerous theoretical studies (see,e.g., Fortney & Nettelmann 2010, for a review), no universal mechanism seems to fully account for the observed radii anomalies.”
• JUPITER MODELS WITH IMPROVED AB INITIO HYDROGEN EQUATION OF STATE (H-REOS.2) (2011, methodology): “…mentioned above, our Jupiter interior and thermal evolution models are generated by essentially the same code as introduced in N08, Nettelmann (2011), and Fortney & Nettelmann (2010), where in the latter case the code was applied to the structure and evolution calculations of Uranus and Neptune.”