Astrophysics Lab Spring Semester 2023 : Studying the variability of the He triplet to enhance the detection of evaporating exoplanet atmospheres
Supervisors: Xavier Dumusque and Vincent Bourrier
With dozens of new detections, the Helium triplet is becoming the main tracer of evaporating exoplanet atmospheres. It is a feature that can be detected from the ground in the near-infrared, and with the upcoming observations provided by the NIRPS instrument, many more detections are awaiting. However, the Helium triplet is also a feature found in stellar spectra, and when searching for the feature in the atmosphere of a transiting exoplanet, one has to remove the average stellar contribution. The Helium triplet is expected to be sensitive to stellar activity, which could significantly impact the characterization of transiting exoplanet atmospheres. The goal of this APL II is to analyze solar data taken with NIRPS, to study the variability of the solar Helium triplet feature over the timescale of a few hours, and estimate the impact on the characterization of transiting exoplanet atmospheres.
In this repository will be stored the Python files used to:
- Analyze solar spectra obtained with the NIRPS instrument
- Investigate the physical processes underlying the variability in the He triplet over short timescales
- Injecting a first-order planetary spectra into the solar spectra to study the impact of the He tripet on retrieved planetary parameters