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The Atmospheres of Extrasolar Super-Earths

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 May 2008

Eliza Miller-Ricci ,
Sara Seager  and
Dimitar Sasselov
Eliza Miller-Ricci
Affiliation:
Harvard Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics60 Garden St., Cambridge, MA 02138 email: [email protected], [email protected]
Sara Seager
Affiliation:
Department of Earth, Atmospheric, and Planetary Sciences, Department of Physics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology54-1626, 77 Massachusetts Ave., Cambridge, MA 02139 email: [email protected]
Dimitar Sasselov
Affiliation:
Harvard Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics60 Garden St., Cambridge, MA 02138 email: [email protected], [email protected]
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Abstract

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Extrasolar super-Earths (1-10 M⊕) are likely to exist with a wide range of atmospheres. While a number of these planets have already been discovered through radial velocities and microlensing, it will be the discovery of the first transiting super-Earths that will open the door to a variety of follow-up observations aimed at characterizing their atmospheres. Super-Earths may fill a large range of parameter space in terms of their atmospheric composition and mass. Specifically, some of these planets may have high enough surface gravities to be able to retain large hydrogen-rich atmosphseres, while others will have lost most of their hydrogen to space over the planet's lifetime, leaving behind an atmosphere more closely resembling that of Earth or Venus. The resulting composition of the super-Earth atmosphere will therefore depend strongly on factors such as atmospheric escape history, outgassing history, and the level of stellar irradiation that it receives. Here we present theoretical models of super-Earth emission and transmission spectra for a variety of possible outcomes of super-Earth atmospheric composition ranging from hydrogen-rich to hydrogen-poor. We focus on how observations can be used to differentiate between the various scenarios and constrain atmospheric composition.

Type
Contributed Papers
Information
Proceedings of the International Astronomical Union , Volume 4 , Symposium S253: Transiting Planets , May 2008 , pp. 263 - 271
Copyright
Copyright © International Astronomical Union 2009

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