Joanna Bulger

Discovery and spectroscopy of the young jovian planet 51 Eri b with the Gemini Planet Imager

An exoplanet extracted from the bright Direct imaging of Jupiter-like exoplanets around young stars provides a glimpse into how our solar system formed. The brightness of young stars requires the use of next-generation devices such as the Gemini Planet Imager (GPI). Using the GPI, Macintosh et al. discovered a Jupiter-like planet orbiting a young star, 51 Eridani (see the Perspective by Mawet). The planet, 51 Eri b, has a methane signature and is probably the smallest exoplanet that has been directly imaged. These findings open the door to understanding solar system origins and herald the dawn of a new era in next-generation planetary imaging. Science, this issue p. 64; see also p. 39 The Gemini Planet Imager detects a Jupiter-like exoplanet orbiting the young star 51 Eridani. [Also see Perspective by Mawet] Directly detecting thermal emission from young extrasolar planets allows measurement of their atmospheric compositions and luminosities, which are influenced by their formation mechanisms. Using the Gemini Planet Imager, we discovered a planet orbiting the ~20-million-year-old star 51 Eridani at a projected separation of 13 astronomical units. Near-infrared observations show a spectrum with strong methane and water-vapor absorption. Modeling of the spectra and photometry yields a luminosity (normalized by the luminosity of the Sun) of 1.6 to 4.0 × 10−6 and an effective temperature of 600 to 750 kelvin. For this age and luminosity, “hot-start” formation models indicate a mass twice that of Jupiter. This planet also has a sufficiently low luminosity to be consistent with the “cold-start” core-accretion process that may have formed Jupiter.

DUST MASSES of DISKS AROUND 8 BROWN DWARFS and VERY LOW-MASS STARS in UPPER SCO OB1 and OPHIUCHUS

We present the results of ALMA band 7 observations of dust and CO gas in the disks around 7 objects with spectral types ranging between M5.5 and M7.5 in Upper Scorpius OB1, and one M3 star in Ophiuchus. We detect unresolved continuum emission in all but one source, and the

Gemini planet imager observational calibrations VIII: characterization and role of satellite spots

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The M-dwarfs in Multiples (MinMs) survey – I. Stellar multiplicity among low-mass stars within 15 pc

CO J=3-2 line in two sources. We constrain the dust and gas content of these systems using a grid of models calculated with the radiative transfer code MCFOST, and find disk dust masses between 0.1 and 1 M

The VAST Survey - I. Companions and the unexpected X-ray detection of B6-A7 stars

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THE ORBIT and TRANSIT PROSPECTS for β PICTORIS b CONSTRAINED with ONE MILLIARCSECOND ASTROMETRY

, suggesting that the stellar mass / disk mass correlation can be extrapolated for brown dwarfs with masses as low as 0.05 M

SPECTROSCOPIC CHARACTERIZATION OF HD 95086 b WITH THE GEMINI PLANET IMAGER

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Improving and Assessing Planet Sensitivity of the GPI Exoplanet Survey with a Forward Model Matched Filter

. The one disk in Upper Sco in which we detect CO emission, 2MASS J15555600, is also the disk with warmest inner disk as traced by its H - [4.5] photometric color. Using our radiative transfer grid, we extend the correlation between stellar luminosity and mass-averaged disk dust temperature originally derived for stellar mass objects to the brown dwarf regime to

1–2.4 μm Near-IR Spectrum of the Giant Planet β Pictoris b Obtained with the Gemini Planet Imager

\langle T_{dust} \rangle \approx 22 (L_{*} /L_{\odot})^{0.16} K

An Optical/Near-infrared Investigation of HD 100546 b with the Gemini Planet Imager and MagAO

, applicable to spectral types of M5 and later. This is slightly shallower than the relation for earlier spectral type objects and yields warmer low-mass disks. The two prescriptions cross at 0.27 L