A SYSTEMATIC RETRIEVAL ANALYSIS OF SECONDARY ECLIPSE SPECTRA. II. A UNIFORM ANALYSIS OF NINE PLANETS AND THEIR C TO O RATIOS

By M. Line, H. Knutson, A. Wolf, Yuk L. Yung. 2013

146 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Secondary eclipse spectroscopy provides invaluable insights into the temperatures and compositions of exoplanetary atmospheres. We carry out a systematic temperature and abundance retrieval analysis of nine exoplanets (HD 189733b, HD 209458b, HD 149026b, GJ436b, WASP-12b, WASP-19b, WASP-43b, TrES-2b, and TrES-3b) observed in secondary eclipse using a combination of space- and ground-based facilities. Our goal with this analysis is to provide a consistent set of temperatures and compositions from which self-consistent models can be compared and to probe the underlying processes that shape these atmospheres. This paper is the second in a three part series of papers exploring the retrievability of temperatures and abundances from secondary eclipse spectra and the implications of these results for the chemistry of exoplanet atmospheres. In this investigation we present a catalogue of temperatures and abundances for H2O, CH4, CO, and CO2. We find that our temperatures and abundances are generally consistent with those of previous studies, although we do not find any statistically convincing evidence for super-solar C to O ratios (e.g., solar C/O falls in the 1σ confidence intervals in eight of the nine planets in our sample). Furthermore, within our sample we find little evidence for thermal inversions over a wide range of effective temperatures (with the exception of HD 209458b), consistent with previous investigations. The lack of evidence for inversions for most planets in our sample over such a wide range of effective temperatures provides additional support for the hypothesis that TiO is unlikely to be the absorber responsible for the formation of these inversions.

Subfields: Astronomy and Astrophysics, Atmospheric Science

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/91242fbc031b86fcf52d551929a51302bd57fdc8

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Citations in the corpus

A PRECISE WATER ABUNDANCE MEASUREMENT FOR THE HOT JUPITER WASP-43b (2014, methodology): “However, interpretation of past results has been challenging for cases when theoretical models do not provide good fits to the observed spectra (e.g. Line et al. 2014) and when measurement reproducibility has been questioned (e.g. Swain et al. 2009; Gibson et al. 2011).”
SPITZER PHASE CURVE CONSTRAINTS FOR WASP-43b AT 3.6 AND 4.5 μm (2016, methodology): “…We derive the planet’s atmospheric composition and thermal structure using the CHIMERA Bayesian retrieval suite, which is described in detail by Line et al. (2013, 2014) and was previously used to interpret WASP-43b’s atmosphere using HST/WFC3 data (Kreidberg et al. 2014; Stevenson et al.…”
A DETECTION OF WATER IN THE TRANSMISSION SPECTRUM OF THE HOT JUPITER WASP-12b AND IMPLICATIONS FOR ITS ATMOSPHERIC COMPOSITION (2015, methodology): “…of the carbon-to-oxygen ratio (C/O) and absolute water abundance, which in some cases rival our knowledge of those quantities for the Solar System planets (e.g. Madhusudhan et al. 2011b; Konopacky et al. 2013; Line et al. 2014; Kreidberg et al. 2014a; Brogi et al. 2014; Madhusudhan et al. 2014b).”
Global Climate and Atmospheric Composition of the Ultra-hot Jupiter WASP-103b from HST and Spitzer Phase Curve Observations (2018, methodology): “Using these opacities and T-P profiles, we calculated thermal emission spectra over the full grid using the CHIMERA retrieval suite (described in Line et al. 2013, 2014).”
Exoplanetary Atmospheres: Key Insights, Challenges, and Prospects (2019, unknown): “(9, 281, 79), Neptune (121), and Uranus (254). The exoplanet H O abundances are from various works: HD 209458b (206, 151), HD 189733b (206, 278), WASP12b (206), WASP-43b (132), WASP-33b (102), TrES-3 (148), GJ 436b (187), HAT-P-26b (277), WASP-39b (206), HR 8799 planets (143), And b (262). have led ”
CHARACTERIZING TRANSITING EXOPLANET ATMOSPHERES WITH JWST (2015, methodology): “…subsequent higher precision observations, more sophisticated data analysis, and powerful modern retrieval techniques for molecular abundances and temperaturepressure (hereafter T-P) profiles (e.g., Benneke 2015; Schwarz et al. 2015; Line et al. 2014a; Diamond-Lowe et al. 2014; Gibson et al. 2011).”
Chemical enrichment of giant planets and discs due to pebble drift (2017, background): “Current observations of hot Jupiters are often consistent with either elevated C/O ratios or possibly C/O ratios close to that of their host star as the uncertainties remain significant (e.g. Line et al. 2014; Madhusudhan et al. 2014a; Kreidberg et al. 2015; Brewer et al. 2017).”
Retrieving scattering clouds and disequilibrium chemistry in the atmosphere of HR 8799e (2020, background): “…in every layer of the discretized atmosphere independently, which is an approach commonly followed in the planetary science community (e.g., Rodgers 2000; Irwin et al. 2008), and which has also been applied to cloud-free brown dwarfs (Line et al. 2014a) and exoplanets (e.g., Lee et al. 2012).”
THE IMPRINT OF EXOPLANET FORMATION HISTORY ON OBSERVABLE PRESENT-DAY SPECTRA OF HOT JUPITERS (2016, background): “Studies contesting the claim of a carbon-rich WASP-12b include Crossfield et al. (2012); Swain et al. (2013); Line et al. (2014); Benneke (2015); Kreidberg et al. (2015).”
A NEW APPROACH TO ANALYZING HST SPATIAL SCANS: THE TRANSMISSION SPECTRUM OF HD 209458 b (2015, background): “In addition, the thermal properties of the planet have been investigated by a number of teams (e.g. Burrows et al. 2007; Knutson et al. 2008; Griffith 2014; Line et al. 2014; Zellem et al. 2014; Schwarz et al. 2015; Evans et al. 2015).”
NO THERMAL INVERSION AND A SOLAR WATER ABUNDANCE FOR THE HOT JUPITER HD 209458B FROM HST/WFC3 SPECTROSCOPY (2016, methodology): “However, Line et al. (2014) and Benneke (2015) showed that there is no strong evidence for high C/O ratios over a wide range of planetary conditions–including those in which inversions are expected.”
 ?> -REx. II. RETRIEVAL OF EMISSION SPECTRA (2015, background): “Its emission spectrum is amongst the most complete and best studied (e.g. Swain et al. 2009; Madhusudhan & Seager 2009; Lee et al. 2011; Line et al. 2012; Line et al. 2014).”