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SUMMARY:Towards nearby Exo-Earths by way of young Neptunes - Suzanne Aigra
 in (University of Oxford)
DTSTART:20220127T160000Z
DTEND:20220127T170000Z
UID:TALK167870@talks.cam.ac.uk
CONTACT:Dr Annelies Mortier
DESCRIPTION:Finding planets similar to the Earth orbiting nearby stars\, s
 o that they can be characterised in detail\, is the key driver for both th
 e PLATO space mission\, which will search 40% of the visible sky for years
  at a time to search for planetary transits\, and the Terra Hunting Experi
 ment (THE)\, which will monitor the radial velocities of a few dozen caref
 ully selected targets for a full decade. Stellar activity is one of the ma
 in limiting factors for both surveys\, as it induces variations in the lig
 ht and RV curves roughly two orders of magnitude larger than the planetary
  signals of interest. My group use data-driven\, but physically and statis
 tically principled methods\, particularly Gaussian Processes\, to model st
 ellar activity and planetary signals simultaneously and disentangle the tw
 o. This novel approach is already enabling us\, for the first time\, to me
 asure masses for transiting planets discovered by K2 and TESS around young
  stars\, where the ratio of stellar activity and planetary signals is simi
 lar. These young systems are precious\, in-situ probes of the key processe
 s which shape the overall exoplanet population\, such as photo-evaporation
 . I will summarise these recent results and outline how existing observati
 ons of the Sun-as-a-star\, can be used to optimize our strategies for find
 ing Earth-like planets with PLATO and THE.
LOCATION:Sackler (sign-up needed) + ONLINE - Details will be sent by email
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