Other
Scientific paper
Oct 2011
adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2011epsc.conf..553d&link_type=abstract
EPSC-DPS Joint Meeting 2011, held 2-7 October 2011 in Nantes, France. http://meetings.copernicus.org/epsc-dps2011, p.553
Other
Scientific paper
We present calculated thermal polarization signals from hot exoplanets, using a doubling-adding radiative transfer model that spatially resolves the disk of the planet, allowing the simulation of horizontally inhomogeneous planets. Our calculations show that the degree of linear polarization, P, of an exoplanet's thermal radiation is expected to be highest near the planet's limb and that this P strongly depends on the temperature and its gradient, and the scattering properties and distribution of the cloud particles. Planets that do not appear to be spherically symmetric, e.g. due to flattening, cloud bands or spots in their atmosphere, differences in their day and night sides, and/or obscuring rings, give P values that are often larger than 0.1%, in favorable cases even reaching several percent at near-infraredwavelengths. Detection of thermal polarization signals can give access to planetary parameters that are otherwise hard to obtain: it immediately confirms the presence of atmospheric clouds, and P can then constrain atmospheric inhomogeneities and the flattening due to the planet's rotation rate. For zonally symmetric planets, the angle of polarization will yield the components of the planet's spin axis normal to the line-of-sight. Our calculations also show that P is generally more sensitive to variability in a cloudy planet's atmosphere than flux is, making polarimetry very suitable for detecting phenomena associated with atmospheric dynamics.
de Kok Remco J.
Karalidi Theodora
Stam Daphne M.
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