研究目的
To study the atmosphere of WASP-80b, a warm inflated gas giant with an equilibrium temperature of ~800 K, using ground-based transmission spectroscopy covering the spectral range from 520 to 910 nm. The observations allow us to probe the existence and abundance of K and Na in WASP-80b’s atmosphere, existence of high-altitude clouds, and Rayleigh-scattering in the blue end of the spectrum.
研究成果
We recover a flat transmission spectrum with no evidence of Rayleigh scattering or K I or Na I absorption, and obtain an improved system characterisation as a by-product of the broadband- and GTC-dataset modelling. The flat transmission spectrum favours an atmosphere model with high-altitude clouds over cloud-free models with stellar or sub-stellar metallicities. Our results disagree with the recently published discovery of strong K I absorption in WASP-80b’s atmosphere based on ground-based transmission spectroscopy with FORS2 at VLT.
研究不足
The signal of interest – variations in the effective planetary radius as a function of wavelength – is minute, corresponding to changes of ~0.01% in the observed transit depth and ~0.1% in the effective planet-star radius ratio. Further complications arise from possible high-altitude clouds, which can mask any atmospheric extinction features, leading to a flat transmission spectrum, and from the fact that atmospheric extinction is not the only source of wavelength-dependent features in transmission spectra.