Barnard's star is a red dwarf, and has the largest proper motion (apparent motion across the sky) of all known stars. At a distance of 1.8 parsecs
, it is the closest single star to the Sun; only the ...three stars in the α Centauri system are closer. Barnard's star is also among the least magnetically active red dwarfs known
and has an estimated age older than the Solar System. Its properties make it a prime target for planetary searches; various techniques with different sensitivity limits have been used previously, including radial-velocity imaging
, astrometry
and direct imaging
, but all ultimately led to negative or null results. Here we combine numerous measurements from high-precision radial-velocity instruments, revealing the presence of a low-amplitude periodic signal with a period of 233 days. Independent photometric and spectroscopic monitoring, as well as an analysis of instrumental systematic effects, suggest that this signal is best explained as arising from a planetary companion. The candidate planet around Barnard's star is a cold super-Earth, with a minimum mass of 3.2 times that of Earth, orbiting near its snow line (the minimum distance from the star at which volatile compounds could condense). The combination of all radial-velocity datasets spanning 20 years of measurements additionally reveals a long-term modulation that could arise from a stellar magnetic-activity cycle or from a more distant planetary object. Because of its proximity to the Sun, the candidate planet has a maximum angular separation of 220 milliarcseconds from Barnard's star, making it an excellent target for direct imaging and astrometric observations in the future.
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ABSTRACT
Small low-mass stars are favourable targets for the detection of rocky habitable planets. In particular, planetary systems in the solar neighbourhood are interesting and suitable for precise ...characterization. The RedDots campaigns seek to discover rocky planets orbiting nearby low-mass stars. The 2018 campaign targeted GJ 1061, which is the 20th nearest star to the Sun. For three consecutive months we obtained nightly, high-precision radial velocity measurements with the HARPS spectrograph. We analysed these data together with archival HARPS data. We report the detection of three planet candidates with periods of 3.204 ± 0.001, 6.689 ± 0.005, and 13.03 ± 0.03 d, which are close to 1:2:4 period commensurability. After several considerations related to the properties of the noise and sampling, we conclude that a fourth signal is most likely explained by stellar rotation, although it may be due to a planet. The proposed three-planet system (and the potential four-planet solution) is long-term dynamically stable. Planet–planet gravitational interactions are below our current detection threshold. The minimum masses of the three planets range from 1.4 ± 0.2 to 1.8 ± 0.3 M⊕. Planet d, with msin i = 1.64 ± 0.24 M⊕, receives a similar amount of energy as Earth receives from the Sun. Consequently it lies within the liquid-water habitable zone of the star and has a similar equilibrium temperature to Earth. GJ 1061 has very similar properties to Proxima Centauri but activity indices point to lower levels of stellar activity.
Understanding the sources of instrumental systematic noise is a must to improve the design of future spectrographs. In this study, we alternated observations of the well-suited pair of M-stars GJ ...725A+B to delve into the sub-night High Accuracy Radial Velocity Planet Searcher for the Northern hemisphere (HARPS-N) response. Besides the possible presence of a low-mass planet orbiting GJ 725B, our observations reveal changes in the spectral energy distribution (SED) correlated with measurements of the width of the instrumental line profile and, to a lower degree, with the Doppler measurements. To study the origin of these effects, we searched for correlations among several quantities defined and measured on the spectra and on the acquisition images. We find that the changes in apparent SED are very likely related to flux losses at the fibre input. Further tests indicate that such flux losses do not seriously affect the shape of the instrumental point spread function of HARPS-N, but identify an inefficient fitting of the continuum as the most likely source of the systematic variability observed in the full width at half-maximum. This index, accounting for the HARPS-N cross-correlation profiles width, is often used to decorrelate Doppler time series. We show that the Doppler measurement obtained by a parametric least-squares fitting of the spectrum accounting for continuum variability is insensitive to changes in the slope of the SED, suggesting that forward modelling techniques to measure moments of the line profile are the optimal way to achieve higher accuracy. Remaining residual variability at ∼1 m s−1 suggests that for M-stars Doppler surveys the current noise floor still has an instrumental origin.
ABSTRACT
We report the detection of a new planetary system orbiting the nearby M2.5V star GJ 357, using precision radial velocities from three separate echelle spectrographs, High Accuracy Radial ...velocity Planet Searcher (HARPS), High Resolution Echelle Spectrograph (HiRES), and Ultraviolet and Visible Echelle Spectrograph (UVES). Three small planets have been confirmed in the system, with periods of 9.125 ± 0.001, 3.9306 ± 0.0003, and 55.70 ± 0.05 d, and minimum masses of 3.33 ± 0.48, 2.09 ± 0.32, and 6.72 ± 0.94 M⊕, respectively. The second planet in our system, GJ 357 c, was recently shown to transit by the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS), but we could find no transit signatures for the other two planets. Dynamical analysis reveals the system is likely to be close to coplanar, is stable on Myr time-scales, and places strong upper limits on the masses of the two non-transiting planets GJ 357 b and GJ 357 d of 4.25 and 11.20 M⊕, respectively. Therefore, we confirm the system contains at least two super-Earths, and either a third super-Earth or mini-Neptune planet. GJ 357 b and GJ 357 c are found to be close to a 7:3 mean motion resonance, however no libration of the orbital parameters was found in our simulations. Analysis of the photometric light curve of the star from the TESS, when combined with our radial velocities, reveals GJ 357 c has an absolute mass, radius, and density of $2.248^{+0.117}_{-0.120}$ M⊕, $1.167^{+0.037}_{-0.036}$ R⊕, and $7.757^{+0.889}_{-0.789}$ g cm−3, respectively. Comparison to super-Earth structure models reveals the planet is likely an iron-dominated world. The GJ 357 system adds to the small sample of low-mass planetary systems with well constrained masses, and further observational and dynamical follow-up is warranted to better understand the overall population of small multiplanet systems in the solar neighbourhood.
We present results from the most comprehensive radio monitoring campaign towards the closest star to our Sun, Proxima Centauri. We report 1.1–3.1 GHz observations with the Australia Telescope Compact ...Array over 18 consecutive days in April 2017. We detected radio emission from Proxima Centauri for most of the observing sessions, which spanned ~1.6 orbital periods of the planet Proxima b. The radio emission is stronger at the low-frequency band, centered around 1.6 GHz, and is consistent with the expected electron-cyclotron frequency for the known star’s magnetic field intensity of ~600 gauss. The 1.6 GHz light curve shows an emission pattern that is consistent with the orbital period of the planet Proxima b around the star Proxima, with its maxima of emission happening near the quadratures. We also observed two short-duration flares (a few minutes) and a long-duration burst (about three days) whose peaks happened close to the quadratures. We find that the frequency, large degree of circular polarization, change in the sign of circular polarization, and intensity of the observed radio emission are all consistent with expectations from electron cyclotron-maser emission arising from sub-Alfvénic star–planet interaction. We interpret our radio observations as signatures of interaction between the planet Proxima b and its host star Proxima. We advocate for monitoring other dwarf stars with planets to eventually reveal periodic radio emission due to star–planet interaction, thus opening a new avenue for exoplanet hunting and the study of a new field of exoplanet–star plasma interaction.
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The results of a search for stellar pulsations in M dwarf stars in the Kepler short-cadence (SC) data base are presented. This investigation covers all the cool and dwarf stars in the list of ...Dressing & Charbonneau, which were also observed in SC mode by the Kepler satellite. The sample has been enlarged via selection of stellar parameters (temperature, surface gravity and radius) with available Kepler Input Catalogue values together with JHK and riz photometry. In total, 87 objects observed by the Kepler mission in SC mode were selected and analysed using Fourier techniques. The detection threshold is below 10 μmag for the brightest objects and below 20 μmag for about 40 per cent of the stars in the sample. However, no significant signal in the ∼10,100 cd−1 frequency domain that can be reliably attributable to stellar pulsations has been detected. The periodograms have also been investigated for solar-like oscillations in the >100 cd−1 region, but with unsuccessful results too. Despite these inconclusive photometric results, M dwarfs pulsation amplitudes may still be detected in radial velocity searches. State-of-the-art coming instruments, like CARMENES near-infrared high-precision spectrograph, will play a key role in the possible detection.
Exoplanets of a few Earth masses can be now detected around nearby low-mass stars using Doppler spectroscopy. In this Letter, we investigate the radial velocity variations of Kapteyn's star, which is ...both a sub-dwarf M-star and the nearest halo object to the Sun. The observations comprise archival and new HARPS (High Accuracy Radial velocity Planet Searcher), High Resolution Echelle Spectrometer (HIRES) and Planet Finder Spectrograph (PFS) Doppler measurements. Two Doppler signals are detected at periods of 48 and 120 d using likelihood periodograms and a Bayesian analysis of the data. Using the same techniques, the activity indices and archival All Sky Automated Survey (ASAS-3) photometry show evidence for low-level activity periodicities of the order of several hundred days. However, there are no significant correlations with the radial velocity variations on the same time-scales. The inclusion of planetary Keplerian signals in the model results in levels of correlated and excess white noise that are remarkably low compared to younger G, K and M dwarfs. We conclude that Kapteyn's star is most probably orbited by two super-Earth mass planets, one of which is orbiting in its circumstellar habitable zone, becoming the oldest potentially habitable planet known to date. The presence and long-term survival of a planetary system seem a remarkable feat given the peculiar origin and kinematic history of Kapteyn's star. The detection of super-Earth mass planets around halo stars provides important insights into planet-formation processes in the early days of the Milky Way.
Abstract
Stellar oscillations appear all across the Hertzsprung–Russell diagram. Recent theoretical studies support their existence also in the atmosphere of M dwarfs. These studies predict for them ...short periodicities ranging from 20 min to 3 h. Our Cool Tiny Beats (CTB) programme aims at finding these oscillations for the very first time. With this goal, CTB explores the short time domain of M dwarfs using radial velocity data from the High Accuracy Radial velocity Planet Searcher (HARPS)-European Southern Observatory and HARPS-N high-precision spectrographs. Here we present the results for the two most long-term stable targets observed to date with CTB, GJ 588 and GJ 699 (i.e. Barnard's star). In the first part of this work we detail the correction of several instrumental effects. These corrections are especially relevant when searching for subnight signals. Results show no significant signals in the range where M dwarfs pulsations were predicted. However, we estimate that stellar pulsations with amplitudes larger than ∼0.5 m s−1 can be detected with a 90 per cent completeness with our observations. This result, along with the excess of power regions detected in the periodograms, opens the possibility of non-resolved very low amplitude pulsation signals. Next generation more precise instrumentation would be required to detect such oscillations. However, the possibility of detecting pulsating M-dwarf stars with larger amplitudes is feasible due to the short size of the analysed sample. This motivates the need for completeness of the CTB survey.
The Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite, TESS, is currently carrying out an all-sky search for small planets transiting bright stars. In the first year of the TESS survey, a steady progress was ...made in achieving the mission’s primary science goal of establishing bulk densities for 50 planets smaller than Neptune. During that year, the TESS’s observations were focused on the southern ecliptic hemisphere, resulting in the discovery of three mini-Neptunes orbiting the star TOI-125, a V = 11.0 K0 dwarf. We present intensive HARPS radial velocity observations, yielding precise mass measurements for TOI-125b, TOI-125c, and TOI-125d. TOI-125b has an orbital period of 4.65 d, a radius of 2.726 ± 0.075 R(E), a mass of 9.50 ± 0.88 M(E), and is near the 2:1 mean motion resonance with TOI-125c at 9.15 d. TOI-125c has a similar radius of 2.759 ± 0.10 R(E) and a mass of 6.63 ± 0.99 M(E), being the puffiest of the three planets. TOI-125d has an orbital period of 19.98 d and a radius of 2.93 ± 0.17 R(E) and mass 13.6 ± 1.2 M(E). For TOI-125b and d, we find unusual high eccentricities of 0.19 ± 0.04 and 0.17(sup +0.08, sub −0.06), respectively. Our analysis also provides upper mass limits for the two low-SNR planet candidates in the system; for TOI-125.04 (R(P) = 1.36 R(E), P = 0.53 d), we find a 2σ upper mass limit of 1.6 M(E), whereas TOI-125.05 (R(P) = 4.2(sup +2.4, sub −1.4 R(E), P = 13.28 d) is unlikely a viable planet candidate with an upper mass limit of 2.7 M(E). We discuss the internal structure of the three confirmed planets, as well as dynamical stability and system architecture for this intriguing exoplanet system.
Aims.
L 98-59 (TIC 307210830, TOI-175) is a nearby M3 dwarf around which TESS revealed three small transiting planets (0.80, 1.35, 1.57 Earth radii) in a compact configuration with orbital periods ...shorter than 7.5 days. Here we aim to measure the masses of the known transiting planets in this system using precise radial velocity (RV) measurements taken with the HARPS spectrograph.
Methods.
We considered both trained and untrained Gaussian process regression models of stellar activity, which are modeled simultaneously with the planetary signals. Our RV analysis was then supplemented with dynamical simulations to provide strong constraints on the planets’ orbital eccentricities by requiring long-term stability.
Results.
We measure the planet masses of the two outermost planets to be 2.42 ± 0.35 and 2.31 ± 0.46 Earth masses, which confirms the bulk terrestrial composition of the former and eludes to a significant radius fraction in an extended gaseous envelope for the latter. We are able to place an upper limit on the mass of the smallest, innermost planet of <1.01 Earth masses with 95% confidence. Our RV plus dynamical stability analysis places strong constraints on the orbital eccentricities and reveals that each planet’s orbit likely has
e
< 0.1.
Conclusions.
L 98-59 is likely a compact system of two rocky planets plus a third outer planet with a lower bulk density possibly indicative of the planet having retained a modest atmosphere. The system offers a unique laboratory for studies of planet formation, dynamical stability, and comparative atmospheric planetology as the two outer planets are attractive targets for atmospheric characterization through transmission spectroscopy. Continued RV monitoring will help refine the characterization of the innermost planet and potentially reveal additional planets in the system at wider separations.
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