Ultra-hot Jupiters (UHJs) are highly irradiated giant exoplanets with extremely high day-side temperatures, which lead to thermal dissociation of most molecular species. It is expected that the ...neutral hydrogen atom is one of the main species in the upper atmospheres of UHJs. Neutral hydrogen has been detected in several UHJs by observing their Balmer line absorption. In this work, we report four transit observations of the UHJ WASP-33b, performed with the CARMENES and HARPS-North spectrographs, and the detection of the H
α
, H
β
, and H
γ
lines in the planetary transmission spectrum. The combined H
α
transmission spectrum of the four transits has an absorption depth of 0.99 ± 0.05%, which corresponds to an effective radius of 1.31 ± 0.01
R
p
. The strong H
α
absorption indicates that the line probes the high-altitude thermosphere. We further fitted the three Balmer lines using the
PAWN
model, assuming that the atmosphere is hydrodynamic and in local thermodynamic equilibrium. We retrieved a thermosphere temperature 12 200
−1000
+1300
K and a mass-loss rate
Ṁ
= 1011.8
−0.5
+0.6
g s
−1
. The retrieved high mass-loss rate is compatible with the “Balmer-driven” atmospheric escape scenario, in which the stellar Balmer continua radiation in the near-ultraviolet is substantially absorbed by excited hydrogen atoms in the planetary thermosphere.
Context.
Theoretical studies predict the presence of thermal inversions in the atmosphere of highly irradiated gas giant planets. Recent observations have identified these inversion layers. However, ...the role of different chemical species in their formation remains unclear.
Aims.
We search for the signature of the thermal inversion agents TiO and Fe in the dayside emission spectrum of the ultra-hot Jupiter WASP-33b.
Methods.
The spectra were obtained with CARMENES and HARPS-N, covering different wavelength ranges. Telluric and stellar absorption lines were removed with
SYSREM
. We cross-correlated the residual spectra with model spectra to retrieve the signals from the planetary atmosphere.
Results.
We find evidence for TiO at a significance of 4.9σ with CARMENES. The strength of the TiO signal drops close to the secondary eclipse. No TiO signal is found with HARPS-N. An injection-recovery test suggests that the TiO signal is below the detection level at the wavelengths covered by HARPS-N. The emission signature of Fe is detected with both instruments at significance levels of 5.7σ and 4.5σ, respectively. By combining all observations, we obtain a significance level of 7.3σ for Fe. We find the TiO signal at
K
p
= 248.0
−2.5
+2.0
km s
−1
, which is in disagreement with the Fe detection at
K
p
= 225.0
−3.5
+4.0
km s
−1
. The
K
p
value for Fe is in agreement with prior investigations. The model spectra require different temperature profiles for TiO and Fe to match the observations. We observe a broader line profile for Fe than for TiO.
Conclusions.
Our results confirm the existence of a temperature inversion layer in the planetary atmosphere. The observed
K
p
offset and different strengths of broadening in the line profiles suggest the existence of a TiO-depleted hot spot in the planetary atmosphere.
Ultra-hot Jupiters (UHJs) are gas giants with very high equilibrium temperatures. In recent years, multiple chemical species, including various atoms and ions, have been discovered in their ...atmospheres. Most of these observations have been performed with transmission spectroscopy, although UHJs are also ideal targets for emission spectroscopy due to their strong thermal radiation. We present high-resolution thermal emission spectroscopy of the transiting UHJ KELT-20b/MASCARA-2b. The observation was performed with the CARMENES spectrograph at orbital phases before and after the secondary eclipse. We detected atomic Fe using the cross-correlation technique. The detected Fe lines are in emission, which unambiguously indicates a temperature inversion on the dayside hemisphere. We furthermore retrieved the temperature structure with the detected Fe lines. The result shows that the atmosphere has a strong temperature inversion with a temperature of 4900 ± 700 K and a pressure of 10
−4.8
−1.1
+1.0
bar at the upper layer of the inversion. A joint retrieval of the CARMENES data and the TESS secondary eclipse data returns a temperature of 2550
−250
+150
K and a pressure of 10
−1.5
−0.6
+0.7
bar at the lower layer of the temperature inversion. The detection of such a strong temperature inversion is consistent with theoretical simulations that predict an inversion layer on the dayside of UHJs. The joint retrieval of the CARMENES and TESS data demonstrates the power of combing high-resolution emission spectroscopy with secondary eclipse photometry in characterizing atmospheric temperature structures.
Accurately estimating the C/O ratio of hot Jupiter atmospheres is a promising pathway towards understanding planet formation and migration, as well as the formation of clouds and the overall ...atmospheric composition. The atmosphere of the hot Jupiter WASP-43b has been extensively analysed using low-resolution observations with HST and
Spitzer,
but these previous observations did not cover the K band, which hosts prominent spectral features of major carbon-bearing species such as CO and CH
4
. As a result, the ability to establish precise constraints on the C/O ratio was limited. Moreover, the planet has not been studied at high spectral resolution, which can provide insights into the atmospheric dynamics. In this study, we present the first high-resolution dayside spectra of WASP-43b with the new CRIRES
+
spectrograph. By observing the planet in the K band, we successfully detected the presence of CO and provide evidence for the existence of H
2
O using the cross-correlation method. This discovery represents the first direct detection of CO in the atmosphere of WASP-43b. Furthermore, we retrieved the temperature-pressure profile, abundances of CO and H
2
O, and a super-solar C/O ratio of 0.78 by applying a Bayesian retrieval framework to the data. Our findings also shed light on the atmospheric characteristics of WASP-43b. We found no evidence for a cloud deck on the dayside, and recovered a line broadening indicative of an equatorial super-rotation corresponding to a jet with a wind speed of ~5kms
−1
, matching the results of previous forward models and low-resolution atmospheric retrievals for this planet.
Atmospheres of highly irradiated gas giant planets host a large variety of atomic and ionic species. Here we observe the thermal emission spectra of the two ultra-hot Jupiters WASP-33b and ...KELT-20b/MASCARA-2b in the near-infrared wavelength range with CARMENES. Via high-resolution Doppler spectroscopy, we searched for neutral silicon (Si) in their dayside atmospheres. We detect the Si spectral signature of both planets via cross-correlation with model spectra. Detection levels of 4.8
σ
and 5.4
σ
, respectively, are observed when assuming a solar atmospheric composition. This is the first detection of Si in exoplanet atmospheres. The presence of Si is an important finding due to its fundamental role in cloud formation and, hence, for the planetary energy balance. Since the spectral lines are detected in emission, our results also confirm the presence of an inverted temperature profile in the dayside atmospheres of both planets.
Ultra-hot Jupiters (UHJs) are expected to possess temperature inversion layers in their dayside atmospheres. Recent thermal emission observations have discovered several atomic and molecular species ...along with temperature inversions in UHJs. We observed the thermal emission spectra of two UHJs (WASP-33b and WASP-189b) with the GIANO-B high-resolution near-infrared spectrograph. Using the cross-correlation technique, we detected carbon monoxide (CO) in the dayside atmospheres of both planets. The detected CO lines are in emission, which agrees with previous discoveries of iron emission lines and temperature inversions in the two planets. This is the first detection of CO lines in emission with high-resolution spectroscopy. Further retrieval work combining the CO lines with other spectral features will enable a comprehensive understanding of the atmospheric properties such as temperature structures and C/O ratios. The detected CO and iron emission lines of WASP-189b have redshifted radial velocities of several km s
−1
, which likely originate from a dayside to nightside wind in its atmosphere. Such a redshifted velocity has not been detected for the emission lines of WASP-33b, suggesting that the atmospheric circulation patterns of the two UHJs may be different.
When observing transmission spectra produced by the atmospheres of ultra-hot Jupiters (UHJs), large telescopes are typically the instrument of choice given the very weak signal of the planet’s ...atmopshere. The aim of the present study is to demonstrate that, for favourable targets, smaller telescopes are fully capable of conducting high-resolution cross-correlation spectroscopy. We apply the cross-correlation technique to data from the 2.1 m telescope at the Wendelstein Observatory, using its high-resolution spectrograph FOCES, in order to demonstrate its efficacy in resolving the atmosphere of the UHJ KELT-9 b. Using three nights of observations with the FOCES spectrograph and one with the HARPS-N spectrograph, we conduct a performance comparison between FOCES and HARPS-N. This comparison considers both single-transit and combined observations over the three nights. We then consider the potential of 2 m class telescopes by generalising our results to create a transit emulator capable of evaluating the potential of telescopes of this size. With FOCES, we detected seven species in the atmosphere of KELT-9b: Ti II, Fe I, Fe II, Na I, Mg I, Na II, Cr II, and Sc II. Although HARPS-N surpasses FOCES in performance thanks to the mirror of the TNG, our results reveal that smaller telescope classes are capable of resolving the atmospheres of UHJs given sufficient observing time. This broadens the potential scope of such studies, demonstrating that smaller telescopes can be used to investigate phenomena such as temporal variations in atmospheric signals and the atmospheric loss characteristics of these close-in planets.
Despite recent progress in the spectroscopic characterization of individual exoplanets, the atmospheres of key ultra-hot Jupiters (UHJs) still lack comprehensive investigations. These include ...WASP-178b, one of the most irradiated UHJs known to date. We observed the dayside emission signal of this planet with CRIRES$^+$ in the spectral K band. By applying the cross-correlation technique and a Bayesian retrieval framework to the high-resolution spectra, we identified the emission signature of 12CO (S/N\,=\,8.9) and H$_2$O (S/N\,=\,4.9), and a strong atmospheric thermal inversion. A joint retrieval with space-based secondary eclipse measurements from TESS and CHEOPS allowed us to refine our results on the thermal profile and thus to constrain the atmospheric chemistry, yielding a solar to super-solar metallicity ($1.4 and a solar C/O ratio ($0.6 We infer a significant excess of spectral line broadening and identify a slight Doppler-shift between the 12CO and H$_2$O signals. These findings provide strong evidence for a super-rotating atmospheric flow pattern and suggest the possible existence of chemical inhomogeneities across the planetary dayside hemisphere. In addition, the inclusion of photometric data in our retrieval allows us to account for stellar light reflected by the planetary atmosphere, resulting in an upper limit on the geometric albedo (0.23). The successful characterization of WASP-178b's atmosphere through a joint analysis of CRIRES$^+$, TESS, and CHEOPS observations highlights the potential of combined studies with space- and ground-based instruments and represents a promising avenue for advancing our understanding of exoplanet atmospheres.
Ultra-hot Jupiters are highly irradiated gas giant exoplanets on close-in orbits around their host stars. The dayside atmospheres of these objects strongly emit thermal radiation due to their ...elevated temperatures, making them prime targets for characterization by emission spectroscopy. We analyzed high-resolution spectra from CARMENES, HARPS-N, and ESPaDOnS taken over eight observation nights to study the emission spectrum of WASP-33b and draw conclusions about its atmosphere. By applying the cross-correlation technique, we detected the spectral signatures of Ti
i
, V
i
, and a tentative signal of Ti
ii
for the first time via emission spectroscopy. These detections are an important finding because of the fundamental role of Ti- and V-bearing species in the planetary energy balance. Moreover, we assessed and confirm the presence of OH, Fe
i
, and Si
i
from previous studies. The spectral lines are all detected in emission, which unambiguously proves the presence of an inverted temperature profile in the planetary atmosphere. By performing retrievals on the emission lines of all the detected species, we determined a relatively weak atmospheric thermal inversion extending from approximately 3400 to 4000 K. We infer a supersolar metallicity close to 1.5 dex in the planetary atmosphere, and find that its emission signature undergoes significant line broadening with a Gaussian full width at half maximum of about 4.5 km s
−1
. Also, we find that the atmospheric temperature profile retrieved at orbital phases far from the secondary eclipse is about 300 to 700 K cooler than that measured close to the secondary eclipse, which is consistent with different day- and nightside temperatures. Moreover, retrievals performed on the emission lines of the individual chemical species lead to consistent results, which gives additional confidence to our retrieval method. Increasing the number of species included in the retrieval and expanding the set of retrieved atmospheric parameters will further advance our understanding of exoplanet atmospheres.
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