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Hot Super-Earth Atmospheres

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The Early Evolution of the Atmospheres of Terrestrial Planets

Part of the book series: Astrophysics and Space Science Proceedings ((ASSSP,volume 35))

Abstract

The search for extrasolar planets has resulted in the discovery of super-Earths, with masses less than ten Earth masses. Regarding the orbital distances, some of these planets are very close to its star, at distances much less than Mercury to the Sun. Since no such planets exist in our solar system, the atmospheres of these hot rocky planets remains largely unknown. In this work, we present the main characteristics of this hot rocky planet population, with a focus on the potential atmospheric composition obtained by assuming different types of planetary composition and using corresponding model calculations. The vaporization of silicate magma is used in order to explore hot atmospheres above 1,000 K. We present how to estimate the range of atmospheric compositions for rocky planets for different semi-major axis and show an application of the results, to the Kepler February 2011 data release. Our model suggests that hot, rocky super-Earth atmospheres can be divided into five types, whose definition is strongly dependent on the initial composition and the planet’s distance to the star. These simple set of parameters provided, can be used to explore atmospheric compositions for current and future candidates provided by the Kepler mission and other searches.

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Acknowledgements

The authors acknowledge support from DFG funding ENP Ka 3142/1-1 and NASA NAI.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Max Planck Institut für Astronomie, Königstuhl 17, 69117, Heidelberg, Germany

    Yamila Miguel & Lisa Kaltenegger

  2. Harvard Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, 60 Garden St., Cambridge, 02138, MA, USA

    Lisa Kaltenegger

Authors
  1. Yamila Miguel
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  2. Lisa Kaltenegger
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Correspondence to Yamila Miguel .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Campus UAB, Sciences Faculty, Institute of Space Sciences (CSIC-IEEC), 2nd Floor, Tower C-5 even, Bellaterra, 08193, Spain

    J.M. Trigo-Rodriguez

  2. , Université Paris Est Créteil, LISA, UMR CNRS/UPEC/UPD/IPSL, avenue du Général de Gaulle 61, Créteil CX, 94010, France

    François Raulin

  3. , Earth and Space Science Coordination, B.USOC, Avenue Circulaire 3, Brussels, 1180, Belgium

    Christian Muller

  4. , Department of Astronomy, University of Maryland, Stadium Dr., Greenbelt, 20742, USA

    Conor Nixon

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Miguel, Y., Kaltenegger, L. (2013). Hot Super-Earth Atmospheres. In: Trigo-Rodriguez, J., Raulin, F., Muller, C., Nixon, C. (eds) The Early Evolution of the Atmospheres of Terrestrial Planets. Astrophysics and Space Science Proceedings, vol 35. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-5191-4_5

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-5191-4_5

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