Project Leader: Prof. F. Pepe

One of the most exciting questions, the habitability of exoplanets, cannot be answered without understanding what they are composed of and how their atmospheres look like. The combination of transit and radial velocity observations provides us direct access to the average density of planets and thus their bulk structure. The study of transmitted, reflected and emitted light of a planet gives access to crucial information on the atmospheric structure and composition, like the pressure-temperature profile, atmospheric scale height, heat redistribution pattern, abundance of various chemical species, presence of clouds or hazes. Atmospheric constituents also provide further important constraints on the bulk composition of the planet, which may not be unambiguously determined by the measured radius and mass alone. The understanding of the interaction between the inner structure and the atmosphere will be fundamental to obtain a complete picture.

Observation

Dr. Ch. Lovis

The first step in the understanding of exoplanetary atmospheres is their observation. Learn how in this subproject we will use existing and future instrumentation to detect signatures from exoplanetary atmospheres. Data reduction, analysis and mining play a crucial role, as well. This sub-project will make extensive use of the DACE platform in order to best exploit available data and models.

 

Building high-fidelity spectrographs

Dr. F. Wildi

Major steps forward in observational astronomy are often linked to technological progresses. Our group has a long-lasting experience in precision spectro-velocimetry. We aim at extending our experience towards high-fidelity spectroscopy and transfer it on extremely-large telescopes for the observation of faint signals. How? Explore the answer within this sub-project and have a look at the Technology Platform.

Dr. D. Ehrenreich