Week 1 Exercises and Activities

February 25, 2014

Gas Retention

As we discovered in this weeks lectures, the distance of the planet from its host star determines its temperature during formation. We also saw that this greatly aects the types of gases and ices that the planet will be able to condense and keep in its atmosphere as it evolves in time. An important variable that we will learn more about next week is escape velocity. In short, this is the minimum speed that an object (be it a particle or extended object like a rocket) must have to escape a planets gravitational pull. Because the escape velocity varies with distance to the center of a gravitational body (like a star or a planet), the size of the planet will also have an aect on the escape velocity. You will also see (by interacting with the simulator) that the density (and thus mass) of the gravitational body will have an aect on the escape velocity. If you are having trouble using the simulation there is a help tab in the upper right hand corner that will describe how to use it.

1.1 1.2

Link: Gas Retention Simulation Goals

Given some combination of a planets parameters (radius, temperature, density), be able to calculate ranges for other parameters so that certain gases are gravitationally bound to the host planet

1.3

Exercises

1. Find the gases that could be gravitationally bound to Titan (a moon of Saturn) 2. Find the gases that could be gravitationally bound to a planet with a radius of 9330 km and a mass of 2 1024 kg and a distance of 4.6 AU from a sun-like star

3. If a planet is 0.3 AU from a sun-like star with a density of water (1 g/cm3 ), what is the minimum radius of the planet if it has oxygen and carbondioxide in its atmosphere?

1.4

Solutions

1.

We see that Titan just barely has enough mass to hold onto oxygen, and can also hold onto carbon dioxide and xenon. Every other gas (beginning with nitrogen) is too light to be gravitationally bound to the moon.

2.

We see that to have a mass of 2 1024 kg we must set the density to 0.6 g/cm3 . To make the planet 4.6 AU from a sun-like star we must set the temperature to 130 K . This shows us that the planet will hold all molecules heavier than (and including) methane, but will not hold hydrogen or helium. So it can hold methane, ammonia, water, nitrogen, oxygen, carbon dioxide, and xenon.

3.

We see that a planet 0.3 AU from a sun-like star would have a surface temperature of 510 K . Since oxygen is harder to hold onto than water, we only need to check that the planet can hold oxygen. If we set the density to 1 g/cm3 and adjust the radius until the line passes through our ctitious planet we see that the radius must be a minimum of about 8280 km.

Radial Velocity

In this weeks lectures we looked at a number of dierent ways astronomers can indirectly discover planets around other stars. One of those methods was the radial velocity method, which uses a color shift of an observed star to determine properties of a planet.

2.1 2.2

Link:Radial Velocity Simulation Goals

Given a radial velocity graph, be able to nd: 1. The eccentricity of its orbit 2. The semi-major axis of the planets orbit 3. The longitude angle (or observing angle) 4. The minimum mass of the planet

2.3

Exercises

1. Given the following observation of a 0.54 Msun stars radial velocity, nd the mass, longitude angle, and semi-major axis of the planet if it has a period of 364 days, an eccentricity of 0.46 and an inclination of 90

2. Given the following observation of a 2 Msun stars radial velocity, nd the mass, longitude angle, and semi-major axis of the planet if it has

a period of 10.1 days, an eccentricity of 0.7 and an inclination of 45 .

2.4

Solutions

Figure 1:

Figure 2: 1. First we set the parameters we know, namely the mass of the star, the inclination and the eccentricity. Notice that the only parameter that aects the period is the semi-major axis, so we set that next. Now we can adjust the symmetry of the curve using the longitude. This will only be a rough estimate and should be around 34.7 10 . Finally, the only thing the mass of the planet will aect is the magnitude of the radial velocity. We adjust this to nd a mass of about 2.75 Mjupiter 0.1 Mjupiter . (See g 1) 2. First we set the parameters we know, namely the mass of the star, the inclination, and the eccentricity. Notice that the only parameter that aects the period is the semi-major axis, so we set that next. Now we can adjust the symmetry of the curve using the longitude. This will only be a rough estimate and should be around 180 10 . Finally, the only thing the mass of the planet will aect is the magnitude of the radial velocity. We adjust this to nd a mass of about 4 Mjupiter 0.2 Mjupiter . (See g 2) 8

Planetary Transit

Another important planetary detection method we discussed is the planetary transit, which looks for periodic dips in a stars brightness to determine properties of a planet.

3.1 3.2

Link: Planetary Transit Simulation Exercises

1. Imagine a system where a hot jupiter with a mass of 10 Mjupiter and a radius of 2 Rjupiter orbits a host star with mass 2 Msun . If it has a circular orbit and a semi-major axis that is the same as the Earths, what is the maximum amount the system can be tilted from 90 for us to be able to detect a planetary transit? What is the length of this planets year? How long does the transit last? 2. For the system described in problem 1, what is the maximum amount the system can be tilted from 90 if instead the planet has the same mass and radius as Earth (you can look these up, for example: go to google and search for mass of earth / mass of jupiter)?

3.3

Solutions

Figure 3:

Figure 4:

10

Figure 5: 1. First we enter the information for the planet and star properties. Next we start to lower the inclination of the orbit. We see that if we go more than a fraction of a degree below 89.5 the orbit of the planet never crosses the star, so the maximum the orbit can be tilted is 0.5 . This planet has a 258 day year, and a transit that lasts 68.4 minutes. (see gure 3) 2. We rst look up the mass and radius of the Earth in units of Jupiters mass and radius. We see that MEarth /MJupiter = .003146 and REarth /RJupiter = .08921 (see gure 4). Next we adjust the inclination, just like we did for problem 1 and see that the maximum inclination is about 89.55 . Notice that the length of the year is the same as for a larger planet (this is because the orbit only depends on the mass of and distance to the star and not the mass of the planet).

11

Habitable Zones

Just by looking in our own solar system we see that not every planet (and moon) is suitable for life. Recall this weeks lectures on the habitable zone, a very rough estimate of the range of distances from a star that liquid water can exist on a planet (as opposed to all of a planets water either freezing or being vaporized). Next week we will learn about stellar modeling and how a star evolves in time. For now, all you need to know is that the size and temperature of a star varies in time, both of which aect the amount of energy a planet receives and impacts its habitable zone. In this simulation we investigate how stellar evolution aects the habitable zone of planets, telling us how long a planet has to evolve.

4.1 4.2

Link: Habitable Zone Simulator Goals

For a given star, understand how its habitable zone changes in time

4.3

Exercises

1. Lets rst begin with the Earth. Since the Earth is believed to be about 4.54 billion years old. At what time was the Earth rst in the habitable zone? At what time will the Earth leave the habitable zone? 2. Assuming that life rst appeared when Earth entered the habitable zone, and exists until Earth leaves the habitable zone, how much total time will life exist on Earth? How much time do we have left before the planet becomes uninhabitable? Will all the water freeze or boil o ? 3. Now choose the star Gliese 581. There are a few things to notice before we answer this question. First we see that this star will live a lot longer than the sun. We also see that the planet Gliese 581 d is tidally locked to the star, meaning the same side is always facing the star, baking one side and freezing the other. Lets assume that life is able to form on a tidally locked planet as long as its center is located in the habitable zone . At what time does planet d rst enter the habitable zone? At what time does planet d leave the habitable zone? 4. How long does life have to arise on this planet? Assuming being in the habitable zone is the only important factor on the possibility of life on a planet (it isnt, this is an oversimplication), is life more likely to form on a low mass star or a sun like star?

12

4.4

Solutions

Figure 6:

13

Figure 7: 1. We see that at time t=0 the Earth is already in the middle of the habitable zone (see gure 6). We see that as we increase the time, the habitable zone moves outward and according to this model the last time the earth is in the habitable zone is around 5.42 billion years. 2. This means that life will have approximately 5.42 billion years to form on Earth. It also means we only have about 0.8 billion years left before our planet is no longer habitable. 3. The planet rst enters the habitable zone around 250 billion years (18 times longer than the current age of the universe). It leaves the habitable zone around 393 billion years. (see gure 7) 4. This gives the planet about 143 billion years for life to arise! Assuming being in the habitable zone is the only requirement for life, this makes it MUCH more likely life will form around a low mass star than a sun like star.

14