This paper discusses the transit model-fitting and multiple-planet search algorithms and performance of the Kepler Science Data Processing Pipeline, developed by the Kepler Science Operations Center ...(SOC). Threshold crossing events (TCEs), which are transit candidate events, are generated by the Transiting Planet Search (TPS) component of the pipeline and subsequently processed in the data validation (DV) component. The transit model is used in DV to fit TCEs to characterize planetary candidates and to derive parameters that are used in various diagnostic tests to classify them. After the signature associated with the TCE is removed from the light curve of the target star, the residual light curve goes through TPS again to search for additional TCEs. The iterative process of transit model-fitting and multiple-planet search continues until no TCE is generated from the residual light curve or an upper limit is reached. The transit model-fitting and multiple-planet search performance of the final release (9.3, 2016 January) of the pipeline is demonstrated with the results of the processing of four years (17 quarters) of flight data from the primary Kepler Mission. The transit model-fitting results are accessible from the NASA Exoplanet Archive. The final version of the SOC codebase is available through GitHub.
We perform a study of stellar flares for the 24,809 stars observed with 2 minute cadence during the first two months of the TESS mission. Flares may erode exoplanets' atmospheres and impact their ...habitability, but might also trigger the genesis of life around small stars. TESS provides a new sample of bright dwarf stars in our galactic neighborhood, collecting data for thousands of M dwarfs that might host habitable exoplanets. Here, we use an automated search for flares accompanied by visual inspection. Then, our public allesfitter code robustly selects the appropriate model for potentially complex flares via Bayesian evidence. We identify 1228 flaring stars, 673 of which are M dwarfs. Among 8695 flares in total, the largest superflare increased the stellar brightness by a factor of 16.1. Bolometric flare energies range from 1031.0 to 1036.9 erg, with a median of 1033.1 erg. Furthermore, we study the flare rate and energy as a function of stellar type and rotation period. We solidify past findings that fast rotating M dwarfs are the most likely to flare and that their flare amplitude is independent of the rotation period. Finally, we link our results to criteria for prebiotic chemistry, atmospheric loss through coronal mass ejections, and ozone sterilization. Four of our flaring M dwarfs host exoplanet candidates alerted on by TESS, for which we discuss how these effects can impact life. With upcoming TESS data releases, our flare analysis can be expanded to almost all bright small stars, aiding in defining criteria for exoplanet habitability.
Abstract
We present an estimate of the occurrence rate of hot Jupiters (7
R
⊕
≤
R
p
≤ 2
R
J
, 0.8 ≤
P
b
≤ 10 days) around early-type M dwarfs based on stars observed by the Transiting Exoplanet ...Survey Satellite (TESS) during its primary mission. We adopt stellar parameters from the TESS Input Catalog and construct a sample of 60,819 M dwarfs with 10.5 ≤
T
mag
≤ 13.5, effective temperatures 2900 ≤
T
eff
≤ 4000 K, and stellar masses 0.45 ≤
M
*
≤ 0.65
M
⊙
. We conduct a uninformed transit search using a detection pipeline based on the box least square search and characterize the searching completeness through an injection and recovery experiment. We combine a series of vetting steps including light centroid measurement, odd/even and secondary eclipse analysis, rotation and transit period synchronization tests as well as inspecting the ground-based photometric, spectroscopic, and imaging observations. Finally, we find a total of nine planet candidates, all of which are known TESS objects of interest. We obtain an occurrence rate of 0.27% ± 0.09% for hot Jupiters around early-type M dwarfs that satisfy our selection criteria. Compared with previous studies, the occurrence rate of hot Jupiters around early-type M dwarfs is smaller than all measurements for FGK stars, although they are consistent within 1
σ
–2
σ
. There is a trend that the occurrence rate of hot Jupiters has a peak at G dwarfs and falls toward both hotter and cooler stars. Combining results from transit, radial velocity, and microlensing surveys, we find that hot Jupiters around early-type M dwarfs possibly show a steeper decrease in the occurrence rate per logarithmic semimajor axis bin (
dN
/
d
log
10
a
) when compared with FGK stars.
Abstract
We carried out a systematic study of full-orbit phase curves for known transiting systems in the northern ecliptic sky that were observed during Year 2 of the TESS primary mission. We ...applied the same methodology for target selection, data processing, and light-curve fitting as we did in our Year 1 study. Out of the 15 transiting systems selected for analysis, seven—HAT-P-7, KELT-1, KELT-9, KELT-16, KELT-20, Kepler-13A, and WASP-12—show statistically significant secondary eclipses and day–night atmospheric brightness modulations. Small eastward dayside hot-spot offsets were measured for KELT-9b and WASP-12b. KELT-1, Kepler-13A, and WASP-12 show additional phase-curve variability attributed to the tidal distortion of the host star; the amplitudes of these signals are consistent with theoretical predictions. We combined occultation measurements from TESS and Spitzer to compute dayside brightness temperatures, TESS-band geometric albedos, Bond albedos, and phase integrals for several systems. The new albedo values solidify the previously reported trend between dayside temperature and geometric albedo for planets with 1500 K <
T
day
< 3000 K. For Kepler-13Ab, we carried out an atmospheric retrieval of the full secondary eclipse spectrum, which revealed a noninverted temperature–pressure profile, significant H
2
O and K absorption in the near-infrared, evidence for strong optical atmospheric opacity due to sodium, and a confirmation of the high geometric albedo inferred from our simpler analysis. We explore the implications of the phase integrals (ratios of Bond to geometric albedos) for understanding exoplanet clouds. We also report updated transit ephemerides for all of the systems studied in this work.
Abstract
We present the discovery of TOI 540 b, a hot planet slightly smaller than Earth orbiting the low-mass star 2MASS J05051443-4756154. The planet has an orbital period of
P
= 1.239149 days ...(±170 ms) and a radius of
, and is likely terrestrial based on the observed mass–radius distribution of small exoplanets at similar insolations. The star is 14.008 pc away and we estimate its mass and radius to be
and
, respectively. The star is distinctive in its very short rotational period of
hr and correspondingly small Rossby number of 0.007 as well as its high X-ray-to-bolometric luminosity ratio of
based on a serendipitous XMM-Newton detection during a slew operation. This is consistent with the X-ray emission being observed at a maximum value of
as predicted for the most rapidly rotating M dwarfs. TOI 540 b may be an alluring target to study atmospheric erosion due to the strong stellar X-ray emission. It is also among the most accessible targets for transmission and emission spectroscopy and eclipse photometry with the James Webb Space Telescope, and may permit Doppler tomography with high-resolution spectroscopy during transit. This discovery is based on precise photometric data from the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite and ground-based follow-up observations by the MEarth team.
The Kepler mission is uniquely suited to study the frequencies of extrasolar planets. This goal requires knowledge of the incidence of false positives such as eclipsing binaries in the background of ...the targets, or physically bound to them, which can mimic the photometric signal of a transiting planet. Using real noise level estimates, we compute the number and characteristics of detectable eclipsing pairs involving main-sequence stars and non-main-sequence stars or planets, and we quantify the fraction of those that would pass the Kepler candidate vetting procedure. By comparing their distribution with that of the Kepler Objects of Interest (KOIs) detected during the first six quarters of operation of the spacecraft, we infer the false positive rate of Kepler and study its dependence on spectral type, candidate planet size, and orbital period. In the process, we also derive a prescription for the signal recovery rate of Kepler that enables a good match to both the KOI size and orbital period distribution, as well as their signal-to-noise distribution.
We report the detection of the first circumbinary planet (CBP) found by Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS). The target, a known eclipsing binary, was observed in sectors 1 through 12 at 30 ...minute cadence and in sectors 4 through 12 at 2 minute cadence. It consists of two stars with masses of 1.1 M and 0.3 M on a slightly eccentric (0.16), 14.6 day orbit, producing prominent primary eclipses and shallow secondary eclipses. The planet has a radius of ∼6.9 R⊕ and was observed to make three transits across the primary star of roughly equal depths (∼0.2%) but different durations-a common signature of transiting CBPs. Its orbit is nearly circular (e 0.09) with an orbital period of 95.2 days. The orbital planes of the binary and the planet are aligned to within ∼1°. To obtain a complete solution for the system, we combined the TESS photometry with existing ground-based radial-velocity observations in a numerical photometric-dynamical model. The system demonstrates the discovery potential of TESS for CBPs and provides further understanding of the formation and evolution of planets orbiting close binary stars.
ABSTRACT Kepler provides light curves of 156,000 stars with unprecedented precision. However, the raw data as they come from the spacecraft contain significant systematic and stochastic errors. These ...errors, which include discontinuities, systematic trends, and outliers, obscure the astrophysical signals in the light curves. To correct these errors is the task of the Presearch Data Conditioning (PDC) module of the Kepler data analysis pipeline. The original version of PDC in Kepler did not meet the extremely high performance requirements for the detection of miniscule planet transits or highly accurate analysis of stellar activity and rotation. One particular deficiency was that astrophysical features were often removed as a side effect of the removal of errors. In this article we introduce the completely new and significantly improved version of PDC which was implemented in Kepler SOC version 8.0. This new PDC version, which utilizes a Bayesian approach for removal of systematics, reliably corrects errors in the light curves while at the same time preserving planet transits and other astrophysically interesting signals. We describe the architecture and the algorithms of this new PDC module, show typical errors encountered in Kepler data, and illustrate the corrections using real light curve examples.
Abstract
Most existing exoplanets are discovered using validation techniques rather than being confirmed by complementary observations. These techniques generate a score that is typically the ...probability of the transit signal being an exoplanet (
y
(
x
) = exoplanet) given some information related to that signal (represented by
x
). Except for the validation technique in Rowe et al. (2014), which uses multiplicity information to generate these probability scores, the existing validation techniques ignore the multiplicity boost information. In this work, we introduce a framework with the following premise: given an existing transit-signal vetter (classifier), improve its performance using multiplicity information. We apply this framework to several existing classifiers, which include
vespa
,
Robovetter
,
AstroNet
,
ExoNet
,
GPC
and
RFC
, and
ExoMiner
, to support our claim that this framework is able to improve the performance of a given classifier. We then use the proposed multiplicity boost framework for
ExoMiner
V1.2, which addresses some of the shortcomings of the original
ExoMiner
classifier, and validate 69 new exoplanets for systems with multiple Kepler Objects of Interests from the Kepler catalog.
Space-based missions such as Kepler, and soon the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS), provide large data sets that must be analyzed efficiently and systematically. Recent work by Shallue & ...Vanderburg successfully used state-of-the-art deep learning models to automatically classify Kepler transit signals as either exoplanets or false positives; our application of their model yielded 95.8% accuracy and 95.5% average precision. Here we expand upon that work by including additional scientific domain knowledge into the network architecture and input representations to significantly increase overall model performance to 97.5% accuracy and 98.0% average precision. Notably, we achieve 15%-20% gains in recall for the lowest signal-to-noise transits that can correspond to rocky planets in the habitable zone. We input into the network centroid time-series information derived from Kepler data plus key stellar parameters taken from the Kepler data release 25 catalog. We also implement data augmentation techniques to alleviate model over-fitting. These improvements allow us to drastically reduce the size of the model, while still maintaining improved performance; smaller models are better for generalization, for example from Kepler to TESS data. This Letter illustrates the importance of including expert domain knowledge in even state-of-the-art deep learning models when applying them to scientific research problems that seek to identify weak signals in noisy data. This classification tool will be especially useful for upcoming space-based photometry missions focused on finding small planets, such as TESS and PLATO.
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