Exoplanetology: Exoplanets & Exomoons

Fishing for Planets: A Comparative Analysis of EPRV Survey Performance in the Presence of Correlated Noise

By Keith Cowing
Status Report
astro-ph.EP
March 27, 2023
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Fishing for Planets: A Comparative Analysis of EPRV Survey Performance in the Presence of Correlated Noise
First two years of simulated observations for the Double Burst inter-night observing strategy as applied to the 40-star target sample with practical constraints on target observability. Stars are shown in order of increasing RA from top to bottom. Orange markers represent nights during which each target was observed, grey markers show observations that were scheduled and then dropped due to simulated weather losses and telescope closures, and grey lines indicate the nights on which these losses occurred. For most stars, we are able to achieve a reasonable approximation of the idealized version of this strategy shown in Figure 4 in spite of these practical constraints. — astro-ph.EP

With dedicated exoplanet surveys underway for multiple extreme precision radial velocity (EPRV) instruments, the near-future prospects of RV exoplanet science are promising. These surveys’ generous time allocations are expected to facilitate the discovery of Earth analogs around bright, nearby Sun-like stars.

But survey success will depend critically on the choice of observing strategy, which will determine the survey’s ability to mitigate known sources of noise and extract low-amplitude exoplanet signals.

Here, we present an analysis of the Fisher information content of simulated EPRV surveys, accounting for the most recent advances in our understanding of stellar variability on both short and long timescales (i.e., oscillations and granulation within individual nights, and activity-induced variations across multiple nights).

In this analysis, we capture the correlated nature of stellar variability by parameterizing these signals with Gaussian Process kernels. We describe the underlying simulation framework as well as the physical interpretation of the Fisher information content, and we evaluate the efficacy of EPRV survey strategies that have been presented in the literature.

We explore and compare strategies for scheduling observations over various timescales and we make recommendations to optimize survey performance for the detection of Earth-like exoplanets.

Arvind F. Gupta, Megan Bedell

Comments: 24 Pages, 11 Figures
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:2303.14571 [astro-ph.EP] (or arXiv:2303.14571v1 [astro-ph.EP] for this version)
https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2303.14571
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Submission history
From: Arvind Gupta
[v1] Sat, 25 Mar 2023 21:40:25 UTC (3,689 KB)
https://arxiv.org/abs/2303.14571

Astrobiology

Keith Cowing

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) 🖖🏻

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