Exoplanets in 2024

Course material can be found online at

http://spiff.rit.edu/classes/exo2024/exo2024.html

.

Outline for the course, class schedule, etc.

Lectures. The list below serves a general guide to the topics and their sequence, but is not definitive.

• Week 1 (Mon, Oct 7): How do we find exoplanets? What do we know so far?
• Week 2 (Wed, Oct 16): Physical properties of exoplanets; the rocky vs. waterworld question
  • Some recent exoplanetary news
• Week 3 (Mon, Oct 21): Case study: The TRAPPIST-1 system
• Week 4 (Mon, Oct 28): Transmission spectroscopy
  • More recent exoplanetary news
• Week 5 (Wed, Nov 13): Full-orbit analysis and "resolving" features
• Week 6 (Mon, Nov 18): Biosignatures and searches for life
• Week 7 (Mon, Nov 25): Student posters / Future plans and facilities

Homework sets

1. Working with the NASA Exoplanet Archive due Monday, Oct 14, at 17:00 PM.
   • Answers to Homework 1
2. Rocky and icy planets due Monday, Oct 21, at 17:00 PM.
   • Answers to Homework 2
3. Transmission spectroscopy of the planet GJ 9827d due Wednesday, Nov 13, at 17:00 PM.
   • Answers to Homework 3

Information on posters

• A blog with examples of good posters, with a good bit of discussion
• Scientific Posters thanks to the Leonhard Center at Penn State.
• An award-winning poster on exoplanets with detailed discussion and tips for good posters. Thanks to Ming Zhao and Jason Wright.
• Examples of posters made by U of Tokyo students for an earlier version of this class, in 2016.

For more information:

There are many, many sources for information about exoplanets. Below are just a few that we may visit frequently during the course.

• NASA's Exoplanet Archive at IPAC
• Extrasolar Planets Encyclopedia from the EU
• Exoplanets.org site
• Extrasolar planet blog courtesy of Greg Laughlin.
• Astrobiology.com does a pretty good job of collecting at least some of the latest publications on exoplanets.
• Miscellaneous collection of recent references I've been using as I prepare material for this course.

Copyright © Michael Richmond. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License.