Exoplanets & Exomoons

TRAPPIST-1h: A Terrestrial-sized Exoplanet at the Snow Line of TRAPPIST-1

By Keith Cowing
Press Release
astro-ph.EP
March 13, 2017
Filed under
TRAPPIST-1h: A Terrestrial-sized Exoplanet at the Snow Line of TRAPPIST-1
TRAPPIST-1h
astro-ph.IM

The TRAPPIST-1 system is the first transiting planet system found orbiting an ultra-cool dwarf star. At least seven planets similar to Earth in radius and in mass were previously found to transit this host star.

Subsequently, TRAPPIST-1 was observed as part of the K2 mission and, with these new data, we report the measurement of an 18.764 d orbital period for the outermost planet, TRAPPIST-1h, which was unconstrained until now. This value matches our theoretical expectations based on Laplace relations and places TRAPPIST-1h as the seventh member of a complex chain, with three-body resonances linking every member.

We find that TRAPPIST-1h has a radius of 0.715 Earth radii and an equilibrium temperature of 169 K, placing it at the snow line. We have also measured the rotational period of the star at 3.3 d and detected a number of flares consistent with an active, middle-aged, late M dwarf.

Rodrigo Luger, Marko Sestovic, Ethan Kruse, Simon L. Grimm, Brice-Olivier Demory, Eric Agol, Emeline Bolmont, Daniel Fabrycky, Catarina S. Fernandes, Valérie Van Grootel, Adam Burgasser, Michaël Gillon, James G. Ingalls, Emmanuël Jehin, Sean N. Raymond, Franck Selsis, Amaury H.M.J. Triaud, Thomas Barclay, Geert Barentsen, Laetitia Delrez, Julien de Wit, Daniel Foreman-Mackey, Daniel L. Holdsworth, Jérémy Leconte, Susan Lederer, Martin Turbet, Yaseen Almleaky, Zouhair Benkhaldoun, Pierre Magain, Brett Morris, Kevin Heng, Didier Queloz
(Submitted on 12 Mar 2017)

Comments: 36 pages, 8 figure, 2 tables. Submitted to Nat. Astron. on 3/10/2017
Subjects: Earth and Planetary Astrophysics (astro-ph.EP); Instrumentation and Methods for Astrophysics (astro-ph.IM); Solar and Stellar Astrophysics (astro-ph.SR)
Cite as: arXiv:1703.04166 [astro-ph.EP] (or arXiv:1703.04166v1 [astro-ph.EP] for this version)
Submission history
From: Rodrigo Luger
[v1] Sun, 12 Mar 2017 19:57:57 GMT (2628kb,D)
https://arxiv.org/abs/1703.04166

Explorers Club Fellow, ex-NASA Space Station Payload manager/space biologist, Away Teams, Journalist, Lapsed climber, Synaesthete, Na’Vi-Jedi-Freman-Buddhist-mix, ASL, Devon Island and Everest Base Camp veteran, (he/him) 🖖🏻