Planetary transit timing variations induced by stellar binarity. The light travel time effect

Abstract

[ABRIDGED] Since the discovery of the first transiting extrasolar planet, transit timing has been recognized as a powerful method to discover and characterize additional planets in these systems. However, the gravitational influence of additional planets is not the only expected source of transit timing variations. In this work, we derive the expected detection frequency of stellar companions of hot-jupiter transiting planets host-stars, detectable by means of transit timing analysis. Since roughly half of the stars in the solar neighborhood belong to binary or multiple stellar systems, the same fraction of binary systems may be expected to be present among transiting planet-host stars, unless planet formation is significantly influenced by the presence of a stellar companion. Transit searches are less affected by the selection biases against long-period binaries that plague radial velocity surveys. If the frequency of binaries among hot-jupiter planets host stars is the same as determined in the solar neighborhood, after 5 years since the discovery of a sample of transiting planets 1.0%+/-0.2% of them have a probability >99% to present transit timing variations >50 sec induced by stellar binarity, and 2.8%+/-0.3% after 10 years, if the planetary and binary orbits are coplanar. Considering the case of random inclinations the probabilities are 0.6%+/-0.1% and 1.7%+/-0.2% after 5 and 10 years respectively. Our estimates can be considered conservative lower limits, since we have taken into account only binaries with periods P>5x10^3 days (a>=6 AU). Our simulations indicate that transit timing variations due to the light travel time effect allow discovery of stellar companions up to maximum separations equal to a\sim36 AU after 5 years since the discovery of the planet (a\sim75 AU after 10 years).

6 pages, 2 figures, 1 table. Accepted for publication in A&A

References in corpus (16)

• DHP Framework: Digital Health Passports Using Blockchain -- Use case on international tourism during the COVID-19 pandemic
• Transit timing effects due to an exomoon
• The sdB+M Eclipsing System HW Virginis and its Circumbinary Planets
• Properties of planets in binary systems. The role of binary separation
• WASP-8b: a retrograde transiting planet in a multiple system
• The frequency of planets in multiple systems
• Determination of the size, mass, and density of "exomoons" from photometric transit timing variations
• Using Transit Timing Observations to Search for Trojans of Transiting Extrasolar Planets
• Using long-term transit timing to detect terrestrial planets
• The Transit Light Curve Project. XI. Submillimagnitude Photometry of Two Transits of the Bloated Planet WASP-4b
• Periastron Precession Measurements in Transiting Extrasolar Planetary Systems at the Level of General Relativity
• Extrasolar planet detection by binary stellar eclipse timing: evidence for a third body around CM Draconis
• Impact of Stellar Dynamics on the Frequency of Giant Planets in Close Binaries
• Stellar proper motion and the timing of planetary transits
• The multiplicity of planet host stars - New low-mass companions to planet host stars
• Lack of Transit Timing Variations of OGLE-TR-111b: A re-analysis with six new epochs

Cited by in corpus (10)

• The Detection and Characterization of a Nontransiting Planet by Transit Timing Variations
• The Ĝ Search for Extraterrestrial Civilizations with Large Energy Supplies. IV. The Signatures and Information Content of Transiting Megastructures
• New prospects for observing and cataloguing exoplanets in well detached binaries
• Multiwavelength Observations of the Candidate Disintegrating sub-Mercury KIC 12557548b
• Multi-site campaign for transit timing variations of WASP-12 b: possible detection of a long-period signal of planetary origin
• Quantifying the challenges of detecting unseen planetary companions with transit timing variations
• Transiting Exoplanet Monitoring Project (TEMP). IV. Refined System Parameters, Transit Timing Variations and Orbital Stability of the Transiting Planetary System HAT-P-25
• Transit-timing measurements with the model-independent barycenter method: Application to the LHS 6343 system
• Searching for orbital decay in a heartbeat star system KIC 3766353
• The Exoplanet Edge: Planets Don't Induce Observable TTVs with a Dominant TTV Period Faster than Half their Orbital Period