2018/05/31 by Natalie R. Hinkel, Cayman Unterborn, Stephen R. Kane +2
Immunology and Microbiology · Physics and Astronomy · #Abundance (ecology) #Alexander von Humboldt Studies #Astronomy and Astrophysical Research #Exoplanet #Giant planet #Giant star #Planet #Planetary system #Stars #Stellar, planetary, and galactic studies #astro-ph.EP
paper · pdf · doi:10.3847/1538-4357/ab27c0
14 pages, 8 figures, 1 Table (full csv table of planet prediction scores included in source files), accepted to the Astrophysical Journal (ApJ)
openalex created_date 2018/06/13 · arxiv created 2019/06/18 · openalex publication_date 2019/07/24 · arxiv updated 2019/07/31 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/05
The presence of certain elements within a star, and by extension its planet, strongly impacts the formation and evolution of the planetary system. The positive correlation between a host star's iron content and the presence of an orbiting giant exoplanet has been confirmed; however, the importance of other elements in predicting giant planet occurrence is less certain despite their central role in shaping internal planetary structure. We designed and applied a machine-learning algorithm to the Hypatia Catalog to analyze the stellar abundance patterns of known host stars to determine those elements important in identifying potential giant exoplanet host stars. We analyzed a variety of different elements ensembles—namely, volatiles, lithophiles, siderophiles, and Fe. We show that the relative abundances of oxygen, carbon, and sodium, in addition to iron, are influential indicators of the presence of a giant planet. We demonstrate the predictive power of our algorithm by analyzing stars with known giant planets and found that they had median 75% prediction score. We present a list of ∼350 stars with no currently discovered planets that have a ≥90% prediction probability likelihood of hosting a giant exoplanet. We investigated archival HARPS data and found significant trends that HIP 62345, HIP 71803, and HIP 10278 host long-period giant planet companions with estimated minimum values of 3.7, 6.8, and 8.5 M J , respectively. We anticipate that our findings will revolutionize future target selection, the role that elements play in giant planet formation, and the determination of giant planet interior structure models.