CHEOPS: A transit photometry mission for ESA's small mission programme

By C. Broeg, A. Fortier, David Ehrenreich, Y. Alibert, Wolfgang Baumjohann, W. Benz, M. Deleuil, M. Gillon, A. Ivanov, R. Liseau and 11 more. 2013

203 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Ground based radial velocity (RV) searches continue to discover exoplanets below Neptune mass down to Earth mass. Furthermore, ground based transit searches now reach milli-mag photometric precision and can discover Neptune size planets around bright stars. These searches will find exoplanets around bright stars anywhere on the sky, their discoveries representing prime science targets for further study due to the proximity and brightness of their host stars. A mission for transit follow-up measurements of these prime targets is currently lacking. The first ESA S-class mission CHEOPS (CHaracterizing ExoPlanet Satellite) will fill this gap. It will perform ultra-high precision photometric monitoring of selected bright target stars almost anywhere on the sky with sufficient precision to detect Earth sized transits. It will be able to detect transits of RV-planets by photometric monitoring if the geometric configuration results in a transit. For Hot Neptunes discovered from the ground, CHEOPS will be able to improve the transit light curve so that the radius can be determined precisely. Because of the host stars' brightness, high precision RV measurements will be possible for all targets. All planets observed in transit by CHEOPS will be validated and their masses will be known. This will provide valuable data for constraining the mass-radius relation of exoplanets, especially in the Neptune-mass regime. During the planned 3.5 year mission, about 500 targets will be observed. There will be 20% of open time available for the community to develop new science programmes.

Subfields: Astronomy and Astrophysics, Geophysics

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/97dc0fee798b1eeeaece2199ee5acc6b0e7307ab

How researchers see this paper

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In Astronomy and Astrophysics

1. N. Madhusudhan
2. Jon Fortney
3. D. Charbonneau
4. J. Winn
5. J. Johnson
6. J. Southworth
7. D. Deming
8. Sara Seager

In Geophysics

1. L. Kaltenegger
2. David Kipping
3. Jingjing Chen
4. D. Sasselov
5. L. Zeng
6. C. Mordasini
7. Th. Henning
8. J. Johnson

Citations in the corpus

• Observations of Transiting Exoplanets with the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) (2014, background): “The most promising JWST targets could be observed by the targeted (nonsurvey) CHEOPS satellite (Broeg et al. 2013) for better transit data to refine radius and bulk density determinations.”
• Compositional Imprints in Density–Distance–Time: A Rocky Composition for Close-in Low-mass Exoplanets from the Location of the Valley of Evaporation (2017, methodology): “Determining this observationally would be very important for example with CHEOPS (Broeg et al. 2013) and later PLATO 2.0 (Rauer et al. 2014).”
• How to Characterize Habitable Worlds and Signs of Life (2017, background): “…Gardner et al. 2006, Clampin et al. 2009, Deming et al. 2009, Kaltenegger & Traub 2009, Barstow & Irwin 2016) as well as upcoming ground-based telescopes (e.g., Broeg et al. 2013, Snellen et al. 2013, Rodler & Lopez-Morales 2014) might be able to detect biosignatures in a rocky planet’s atmosphere.”
• PROBABILISTIC FORECASTING OF THE MASSES AND RADII OF OTHER WORLDS (2016, background): “Conversely, the CHEOPS mission (Broeg et al. 2013) will try to detect the transits of planets discovered with radial velocities, necessitating a forecast of the radius based upon the mass.”
• CHARACTERIZING K2 PLANET DISCOVERIES: A SUPER-EARTH TRANSITING THE BRIGHT K DWARF HIP 116454 (2014, background): “Moreover, the brightness of the 34 http://www.exoplanets.org host star makes HIP 116454 ideal for follow–up with the upcoming CHEOPS mission (Broeg et al. 2013).”
• PLANETARY POPULATION SYNTHESIS COUPLED WITH ATMOSPHERIC ESCAPE: A STATISTICAL VIEW OF EVAPORATION (2014, background): “This is of high interest in view of several future high-precision photometric missions like TESS (Ricker et al. 2010) or CHEOPS (Broeg et al. 2013).”
• The Habitability of Planets Orbiting M-dwarf Stars (2016, background): “ESA’s CHEOPS mission (Broeg et al., 2013) and potentially ExoplanetSAT (Smith et al., 2010) will also monitor nearby stars for transit signatures in short order from space, while ExTrA (Bonfils et al., 2014) will combine spectroscopy with photometry to improve their ground-based transit search.”
• The Occurrence and Architecture of Exoplanetary Systems (2014, background): “The European CHEOPS mission (Broeg et al. 2013) aims to achieve precise photometry for bright stars, to search for transits of Doppler planets and improve upon the light curves of previously-detected transiting planets.”
• Modules for Experiments in Stellar Astrophysics (MESA): Pulsating Variable Stars, Rotation, Convective Boundaries, and Energy Conservation (2019, unknown): “The Characterizing Exoplanets Satellite will complement these surveys by providing a unique, large sample of high precision photometric monitoring of selected bright target stars (Broeg et al. 2013; Gaidos et al. 2017).”