2023ApJ...956L..43J -
Astrophys. J., 956, L43 (2023/October-3)
Probing Reflection from Aerosols with the Near-infrared Dayside Spectrum of WASP-80b.
JACOBS B., DESERT J.-M., GAO P., MORLEY C.V., ARCANGELI J., BARAT S., MARLEY M.S., MOSES J.I., FORTNEY J.J., BEAN J.L., STEVENSON K.B. and PANWAR V.
Abstract (from CDS):
The presence of aerosols is intimately linked to the global energy budget and the composition of a planet's atmosphere. Their ability to reflect incoming light prevents energy from being deposited into the atmosphere, and they shape the spectra of exoplanets. We observed five near-infrared secondary eclipses of WASP-80b with the Wide Field Camera 3 (WFC3) aboard the Hubble Space Telescope to provide constraints on the presence and properties of atmospheric aerosols. We detect a broadband eclipse depth of 34 ± 10 ppm for WASP-80b. We detect a higher planetary flux than expected from thermal emission alone at 1.6σ, which hints toward the presence of reflecting aerosols on this planet's dayside, indicating a geometric albedo of Ag < 0.33 at 3σ. We paired the WFC3 data with Spitzer data and explored multiple atmospheric models with and without aerosols to interpret this spectrum. Albeit consistent with a clear dayside atmosphere, we found a slight preference for near-solar metallicities and for dayside clouds over hazes. We exclude soot haze formation rates higher than 10–10.7 g cm–2s–1 and tholin formation rates higher than 10–12.0 g cm–2s–1 at 3σ. We applied the same atmospheric models to a previously published WFC3/Spitzer transmission spectrum for this planet and found weak haze formation. A single soot haze formation rate best fits both the dayside and the transmission spectra simultaneously. However, we emphasize that no models provide satisfactory fits in terms of the chi-square of both spectra simultaneously, indicating longitudinal dissimilarity in the atmosphere's aerosol composition.
Abstract Copyright:
© 2023. The Author(s). Published by the American Astronomical Society.
Journal keyword(s):
Exoplanets - Extrasolar gaseous planets - Exoplanet atmospheres - Exoplanet atmospheric composition
Simbad objects:
1
Full paper
View the references in ADS
To bookmark this query, right click on this link: simbad:2023ApJ...956L..43J and select 'bookmark this link' or equivalent in the popup menu