PLATO aims at the detection and characterization of terrestrial planets around solar-type stars as well as at the study of their host star properties. The key performance of PLATO is to detect terrestrial planets orbiting in the habitable zone of these stars. This science goal drives the design and the operations of the mission. The PLATO Payload features a complex multi-telescope...
The PLATO mission will make available to the community a broad range of data products for the stars of the PLATO Input Catalogue. The product levels cover from raw data to clean light curves, including intermediate products, and catalogues with the planetary candidates, stellar asteroseismic parameters, and stellar properties. For a set of approximately 20,000 stars, the so-called Prime...
PLATO will begin observing stars in the Southern Field (LOPS2) after launch in late 2026. By this time, TESS will have observed the stars in LOPS2 for at least four years. On average each star in the PLATO field has been monitored for 270 days by TESS already. This data gives us insights into the stars that PLATO will observe and we create a catalogue of all the information we can obtain...
PLATO’s top-level science goal is to discover and characterise a sample of small (terrestrial and sub-Netpune size) transiting planets orbiting in the habitable zone of bright stars, and to measure their radii, masses and ages with accuracies of 3, 10% and 10%, respectively. To achieve this goal requires an exquisite understanding of stellar variability signals, from magnetic cycles to spots,...
The AutoRegressive Planet Search (ARPS) methodology is a pipeline for the analysis of space-based transiting data. It performs maximum likelihood fitting of low-dimensional ARIMA models to remove stellar and instrumental variations brief transits are largely unaltered. A novel Transit Comb Filter periodogram is applied to ARIMA residuals. Tests with simulations and real data show ARIMA+TCF...
One of the biggest hurdle in the transit field has been the initial detection of planetary signals within light curves. While this difficulty is multifactorial, it mostly comes from the stellar activity of the host and the shallow nature of exoplanet transits. The stellar activity varies over a range of timescales, with effects both shorter and longer than the transits themselves. This makes...
The current catalog of more than 5000 confirmed exoplanets shows a great diversity of planetary systems: they differ greatly in their sizes, separations, masses, and stellar host characteristics. Transit surveys, including Kepler and TESS, unveiled a large population of small planets orbiting within 1 au of their host stars. By correcting for observational and survey biases, we can study the...
Characterizing Exoplanets Satellite (CHEOPS) is the first ESA space mission dedicated to the study of known exoplanets. The satellite, carrying a 30cm photometric telescope, carried out its 3.5-year nominal mission between December 2019 and September 2023 is currently in it’s first extended mission. CHEOPS is performing ultra-high precision photometry of exoplanetary systems with a sensitivity...
We present the detailed characterisation of TOI-837 b, a transiting exoplanet orbiting a 35 +/- 5 Myr star. Utilising an integrative approach combining TESS photometry, ground-based observations, and HARPS spectroscopy, this study presents the precise determination of TOI-837b's radius, mass, and (a relatively high) density. Given the precise age estimate of the system, we can estimate that...
Fitting planet formation models to exoplanet demographics necessitates to generate hundred of thousands of systems. Yet, modelling every planet formation processes (growth, migration), in a single simulation is still beyond our computational capabilities. The population synthesis approach aims at combining fast semi-analytical recipes modelling the important physical processes at play, to keep...
High resolution spectroscopy will play a key role in the ground based follow-up of PLATO targets. On the one hand, radial velocities will be fundamental for the measurement of planet masses, with ~10 cm/s precision needed to detect Earth analogs. On the other hand, transmission spectroscopy measurements will allow to characterise their atmospheres. These objectives remain, however, severely...
The goal of exoplanet demographics is to determine the occurrence rate of planets as a function of as many of the physical parameters that may influence planet formation and evolution as possible, over as broad of a range of these parameters as possible, and to establish the existence of trends and correlations between them, or lack thereof. I will provide an overview of the state-of-the-art...
Most detected transiting planets have orbits which would fit within that of Mercury. This host star proximity means that the properties of these planets undergo significant changes due to stellar irradiation and interactions. In contrast, temperate planets with longer orbital periods are less affected, offering crucial insights into their formation and migration histories. Characterizing...
The current sample of Circumbinary Planets (CBPs) remains very small, comprising only 14 well-characterised planets discovered through transits by Kepler and the TESS mission, along with a few more found using alternative methods. Additionally, there is ongoing debate regarding CBP detections from timing variations in eclipses of post common envelope binaries (PCEBs). CBPs discovered through...
Half of the Sun-like stars in our galaxy have a stellar companion. The number of detected planets orbiting binary stars is rapidly increasing thanks to the follow-up of TESS planet candidates by GAIA and direct imaging, which detect stellar companions in systems known to host planets. Important questions regarding the origin and demographics of planets in binaries are starting to be explored,...
Sub-Neptunes, i.e. planets with a radius in the 1-4 Earth radius range, are estimated to exist in close-in orbits around 30 to 50% of all Sun-like stars. A leading model for the formation of this population is the "breaking the chain" model. In this model, close-in systems of sub-Neptunes form in resonant chains due to the migration of planets in the protoplanetary discs. After the disc...
Multi-planet systems are important for understanding how the planets form and evolve. The information about the planetary system evolutionary scenarios is encrypted in one of the robust observational features, namely mean-motion resonances. We present a new method in which the resonance structure can be used to characterise the planetary architectures during different phases of planetary...
With thousands of exoplanets now identified, the characterization of habitable planets and the potential identification of inhabited ones is a major challenge for the coming decades. To address this challenge, we developed an innovative approach to assess habitability and inhabitation by coupling for the first time the atmosphere and the interior modeling with the biological activity based on...
Ultra short period (USP) planets have orbital periods of less than one day. While their origins are unknown, it was proposed that these peculiar planets could have been formed further out in the protoplanetary disk and migrated inwards through some dynamical interactions to short orbital distances from the star. We present the discovery of a USP (P=0.38d) super-Earth planet transiting a M...
HIP41378 is a fascinating system hosting at least 5 exoplanets discovered by the K2 mission in 2016. The study of this system is a unique opportunity to prepare the PLATO mission for 3 main reasons: the host is a bright (V=8.9) asteroseismic target typical of the P1 sample, the planets are transiting, and they have long orbital periods (from 2 weeks to 1.5 years). Particularly, HIP41378f, a...
Planetary system architectures represent an additional class of observational constraints to planet formation and evolution theory besides the ones coming from the overall demographics of (individual) planets and the precise characterisation of specific planets. Examples are the frequency of mean motion resonances, correlations regarding the presence of different planet types within one system...
Stellar atmospheres serve as a crucial gateway to understanding the primordial composition of planetary systems. As planet-forming disks dissipate within a few million years, stellar observations become the primary means to probe their remnants. While conventional models assume a direct correspondence between the compositions of rocky exoplanets and their host stars, recent work by Adibekyan...
Traditionally, star formation and planet formation have been studied independently. However, we now know that the first phase of stellar evolution is affected by the accretion from protoplanetary disks. Planet formation theory predicts that the composition of the gas accreted by the star must have been variable: the growth and inward drift of dust in the disk leads to a "pebble wave" of...
The migration of planets through disc-planet interactions is likely to be important during planet formation. Evidence for migration is provided by systems of multiple exoplanets in which planets are in mean motion resonances and by the orbital configurations of circumbinary planets. However, attempts to reproduce the known population of exoplanets by planetary population synthesis models that...
The exoplanet population with relatively short orbital periods around solar-type stars is dominated by small planets (SPs), i.e. super-Earths and sub-Neptunes. These planets are, however, missing in our Solar System, and the reason for that is unknown. By studying the impact of cold Jupiters (CJs) on the formation and/or migration of SPs, several theoretical works have predicted either an...
Stars with astrometric signatures such astrometric acceleration from Gaia or Gaia-Hipparcos proper motion anomaly are known to host additional companions at close separations. In some cases these signatures are due to substellar and even planetary-mass companions, otherwise they are due to stellar companions at separation from a few AU to about 100-200 au. Such companions in some cases are...
By characterizing precisely both exoplanet and parent star and their age, PLATO will bring a new perspective to the study of exoplanets and the understanding of their evolution and formation history. For planets with large atmosphere, their progressive cooling and contraction may be constrained. The possibility to measure secondary eclipses and infer eccentricities of close-in planets means...
Although PLATO is focussed on the detection of small, rocky planets in the habitable zone, there is much still to learn about giant planets, and PLATO will make a significant contribution here. One unsolved problem is the origins of warm Jupiters (WJs). If they formed beyond the snow line, far from their host stars, then migration is required to bring them to their current orbits. It is...
In the midst of the era of JWST, CHEOPS and ground-based spectrographs such as ESPRESSO, we are obtaining unprecedented data, spanning from atmospheric metallicities of sub-Neptunes to tidal deformation of hot Jupiters. However, a deeper characterization requires radii of low-mass planets around Sun-like stars, precise ages at all spectral types, and Love numbers at colder equilibrium...
Sub-Neptune and Neptune-sized Exoplanets exhibit a more and more surprising wide diversity of masses and bulk density. Determining their internal composition is, actually, a key parameter that can provide insights into whether these planets are predominantly composed of volatile materials or if they have significant amounts of denser substances such as water or rocky materials. Such...
Many tightly-packed transit-detected systems harbor complex dynamical evolution governed by two-body resonances and/or chains of resonances. I will discuss recent results showing how formation and evolution studies can be useful to constrain the orbital parameters of these systems, which generally suffer from significant observational uncertainties. More precisely, I will show how i) periodic...
Although over 5000 validated exoplanets are currently known, there are still large gaps in our understanding of how planets form and evolve. Young exoplanets (<1Gyr) hold the key to answering many of these outstanding questions, existing in one of the most interesting eras of exoplanet evolution, where their orbital locations, compositions and atmospheres are rapidly evolving. Such exoplanets...
Planetary formations naturally forms resonant chains of planets, but few such systems persist for more than 1Gyr due to evolutionary events such as destabilisation, planet-planet scattering, mass loss, etc. Therefore systems in resonant chains, especially pristine first-order chains of three-body Laplace resonances, are key windows for the charactersation of unmodified exoplanets. A system of...
The thousands of exoplanet discoveries have shown us that planets are ubiquitous, come in various sizes and architectures and are found orbiting different stars. Exploring this broad variety of exotic worlds, studying planets both like and unlike our own, allows us insights in the mechanisms of planet formation and evolution. In this talk I will take you on a tour of exoplanets characterised...
The radius distribution of Earth- to Neptune-size exoplanets contains two dominant peaks assigned to populations of predominantly rocky and volatile-rich objects, respectively, separated by a valley at 1.7 Earth-radii. Understanding the exact composition, formation, and evolution of such objects is a major challenge in current exoplanet research. Previous work has compared radius distributions...
ESA PLATO and NASA Roman are both scheduled for launch in 2026, and both will undertake ground-breaking exoplanet surveys that will be transformative for studies of exoplanetary architecture. As the recently appopinted ESA Scientist to the Roman Galactic Exoplanet Survey, I will outline the Roman exoplanet science goals and highlight powerful PLATO-Roman science synergies. Roman will...
We present new CHEOPS data for the two inner super-Earths (P=3.5 and 6.4 days) and one outer sub-Neptune (P=13.6 days) of the compact HIP 29442 system, allowing us to significantly improve the radius precision and accuracy of all three planets. Especially for the 6.4 day planet, this significantly changes the inferred nature of the planet and leads us to conclude that caution is required when...
The quest for exoplanet discoveries has been significantly advanced by searching stellar light curves from space missions like CoRoT, Kepler, K2, and TESS. Traditional detection pipelines, employing methods such as the Box Least Squares (BLS), search these light curves for periodic transits. However, these methods often overlook single transits, especially those with shallow depths of smaller...
The effects of star spots on the detectability of transiting exoplanets is not well understood across stellar types and transit depths. I will present work done on simulating light curves for a range of stellar parameters and planet orbital parameters relevant to the upcoming PLATO mission. These simulations include realistic, time-evolving, star spot distributions across the stellar surface,...
Planets orbiting close to their stars are strongly influenced by stellar tidal forces which deform the shape of the planet. Measuring the deformed shape of such exoplanets allows to better constrain planetary properties such as their true radii and densities. Furthermore, measuring deformation can reveal crucial information about the interior structure of such planets since the degree of...
The newly selected Venus missions EnVISION and VERITAS (Venus Emissivity, Radio Science, InSAR, Topography, and Spectroscopy) offer new opportunities for studying Venus but will also contribute to furthering our knowledge of Venus as an exoplanet. Hot rocky planets are favored targets due to generally more frequent transits than cooler Earth-like objects. In this work we simulate Venus as an...
In the past decade, correlations between stellar elemental abundances of planet hosting stars and their orbiting bodies have been extensively explored in multiple studies (e.g. Adibekyan+, 2012a; Santos+, 2017a & b; Teske+, 2019; Tautvaišienė+, 2022). There is a broad consensus on the prevalence of giant-planets around metal-rich stars (e.g. Fischer and Valenti, 2005; Adibekyan+, 2012a;...
We have developed the Transit Investigation and Recoverability Application (TIaRA) pipeline, a tool for making sensitivity maps for transit surveys based on the timestamps and precision of the photometry. We combine these with occurrence rates derived from Kepler to estimate yields for transit surveys. We apply TIaRA to the TESS Southern Ecliptic Hemisphere, and predict 2271(+241−138)...
As the Venus decade approaches, one of the outstanding questions to be addressed by the future missions that will investigate the hellish twin sister of the Earth, is what can Venus tell us about terrestrial potentially habitable exoplanets. Recent studies indicated that some exoplanets - both terrestrial and gaseous - may be characterized by dense atmospheres possibly rich in CO2, just like...
The first long pointing field of PLATO has been recently selected (LOPS2). Accurate characterization of this region of the sky is of great relevance for the preparation and future success of PLATO. It is possible to derive space-based photometry of stars in LOPS2 before the launch of PLATO given that the TESS satellite has repeadetly observed it during the past years. The DIAmante pipeline is...
The study of exoplanet satellites, commonly referred to as exomoons, holds promise in the fields of exoplanet formation, astrobiology, and planetology. Research on planets within the Solar System suggests that satellites play a crucial role in fostering internal activity on Earth-like planets. Consequently, the potential presence of an exomoon orbiting an exoplanet becomes a significant...
The ESA PLATO (PLAnetary Transits and Oscillations of stars) mission aims at the detection and characterisation (radii, mass, density, age) of terrestrial exoplanets in orbits up to the habitable zone around Sun-like stars. To achieve these goals, an optimised complementary Ground-based Observations Programme (GOP) is set up with the purpose to provide the spectroscopic, photometric and...
Introduction: As more accurate Telescopes and missions are developed, the number of exoplanet detections keep increasing. The characterization of these planets and their statistical investigations are important steps to understand the formation of the planet and planetary system. Additionally metallicity plays a critical role in planet formation mechanisms. An updated version of the parameters...
Context. Transmission spectroscopy is a prime technique to study the chemical composition and structure of exoplanetary atmospheres. Strong excess absorption signals have been detected in the optical Na I D1, 2 Fraunhofer lines during transits of hot Jupiters, which are attributed to the planetary atmospheres and allow us to constrain their structure. Aims. We study the atmosphere of WASP-7 b...
Recent advancements in astronomical polarimetry have enabled the detection and characterization of exoplanets, providing insights into their orbital parameters, atmospheric composition, and reflective properties. By combining polarimetric studies with spectroscopy and photometry, a comprehensive understanding of exoplanets, including non-transiting hot Jupiters like Ups And b, can be achieved....
The growing volume of data from space missions renders manual exoplanet candidate identification impractical. Machine learning offers a solution, but conventional methods struggle with signal noise inherent in observations. This work proposes a conceptual trial for a novel deep learning approach to exoplanet classification using convolutional neural networks (CNNs). We introduce a technique...
We present our synergic strategy that merges the potential of asteroseismology with solar space climate techniques in order to characterize solar-like stars and their interaction with hosted exoplanets. The method is based on the use of seismic data obtained by the space missions TESS Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite, coupled with stellar activity estimates deduced from ground-based...
It is the optimal time to characterize the Earth-like exoplanets to detect biosignatures beyond the Earth because such exoplanets will be the prime targets of big-budget missions like JWST, HabEx, LUVOIR, ELT, HWO, etc. We modelled the phase curves of albedo and disk-integrated polarization by using appropriate scattering phase matrices and integrating the local Stokes vectors over the...
We will present the PLATOSpec project which is designed as ground-based support spectrographs of PLATO space mission. The instrument will be located at E1.52-m telescope at La Silla, Chile. PLATOSpec will have spectral resolving power of 70k and it will be efficient in blue wavelength range to characterise stellar variability. Here, first results from interim spectrograph PUCHEROS+, which...
The ESA M-class PLAnetary Transits and Oscillation of Stars (PLATO) mission will acquire light curves of pre-selected targets included in the PLATO Input Catalogue (PIC). PLATO primarily targets solar-type stars, but low mass stars will also be observed being of great interest within the exoplanet field. One of the target samples outlined in the Science Requirement Document is the P4...
The PLAnetary Transits and Oscillations of stars (PLATO) telescope is going to study a large number of extrasolar planetary systems. Given the design of the mission, PLATO will produce long-duration uninterrupted high precision photometry of a significant number of host stars and as a result, PLATO is best suited for phase curve studies of transiting exoplanets. We present a scientific...
New-generation of high contrast instruments (SPHERE/VLT, GPI/Gemini, SCExAO/Subaru) can be used to unveil features, in the form of giant moons or disks, within the Hill radius of directly imaged substellar objects.
Following a dedicated study on SPHERE observations, we detected a candidate satellite companion of 1 MJup on a 10 au orbit around the low-mass brown dwarf DH Tau B (10 MJup).
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Over the past two decades, an extraordinary revolution has ensued in our understanding of planetary systems beyond our own, driven largely by the transit missions Kepler and TESS - and soon to be with PLATO. Because the transiting missions have relatively poor spatial resolution, high resolution imaging has become standard practice in the vetting of planetary candidates as the community works...
The installation in 2012 of the high-resolution, ultra-stable spectrograph HARPS-N at the Telescopio Nazionale Galileo has represented a pivotal point for the mass determination of super-Earths and mini-Neptunes from the Northern Hemisphere. In synergy with Kepler, TESS and CHEOPS space missions, the HARPS-N Collaboration has provided accurate densities for over 50 transiting small planets and...
Earth-sized extrasolar planets orbiting in the habitable zones of solar-like stars are prime targets to look for evidence supporting the existence of life on other planets in the Universe. However, until now neither radial velocity nor transit photometry techniques were precise enough to detect and characterise a potential signal stemming from an Earth-twin. With the launch of the PLATO...
The detection of exoplanets rely heavily on space-based transit surveys such as Kepler, TESS and PLATO. In these surveys, detecting and characterising small planets pose challenges due to their low signal-to-noise ratio (SNR). Traditional methods, such as the BLS, exploit the periodic nature of orbits to enhance the SNR. But these methods are fundamentally limited when gravitational...
Space-based photometry allows observing activity-induced brightness modulations at the surface of solar-type and low-mass stars, opening the door to surface rotation measurements and activity monitoring in such targets. The PLATO stellar analysis pipeline will provide such measurements for as many targets as possible, including exoplanet host-stars for which they will be important inputs to...
The GAIA space mission has revolutionized our understanding of the Milky Way, offering an unparalleled data set for over 1 billion stars and celestial bodies, thereby setting a new benchmark for precision in stellar and exoplanetary science. This advancement is particularly synergistic with the goals of the PLATO (PLAnetary Transits and Oscillations of stars) mission, which aims to discover...
