Institute of Astrophysics and Space Sciences (IA), Porto | 2019 Oct 11
A team of Instituto de Astrofísica e Ciências do Espaço (IA) researchers has published an article, led by Solène Ulmer-Moll, which shows that by knowing an exoplanet’s mass and equilibrium temperature, it’s possible to constrain its radius, with higher accuracy than previous methods.
Solène Ulmer-Moll, a PhD student at the Science Faculty of the University of Porto (FCUP) explains this result was obtained by using knowledge from different fields: “This novel way to forecast exoplanet radius is a perfect example of the synergy between exoplanet science and machine learning techniques.”
To characterize a planet, both its mass and radius are needed, in order to find the planet’s density, and from that infer its composition. But both data are only available for a reduced number of exoplanets, since the mass is often determined by radial velocity measurements, while radius is measured with the transit method.
The team developed an algorithm which accurately forecasts the radius of a wide range of exoplanets, if several other planetary and stellar parameters are known, mainly, the exoplanet's mass and equilibrium temperature. Solène Ulmer-Moll adds: “For the hundreds of planets discovered with the radial velocity method, we are now able to predict their radius. We can then understand if these exoplanets are potentially rocky worlds.” ...
Beyond the Exoplanet Mass-Radius Relation ~ Solène Ulmer-Moll et al
- Astronomy & Astrophysics 630:A135 (Oct 2019) DOI: 10.1051/0004-6361/201936049
- arXiv.org > astro-ph > arXiv:1909.07392 > 16 Sep 2019