The Short Period Planets Group — S(u)PerP(i)G

Susie Superpig
Susie Superpig

The Short Period Planets Group S(u)PerP(i)G is an international collaboration to find, confirm, and study extrasolar (or exo-) planets orbiting very close to their host stars and in short periods (< 1 day). Already, many candidate planets have been found by our group and others using data from the Kepler and K2 missions.

From wispy gas giants on the verge of disruption to tiny rocky bodies already falling apart, short period exoplanets pose a severe challenge to theories of planet formation and evolution, but they dominate observational constraints on planetary composition, internal structure, meteorology, and more. So understanding these planets is crucial for understanding planets in general.

A full list of all of our ultra-short-period planet candidates can be found here.

Collaborators

Our collaboration consists of experts in exoplanetary transit analysis, radial velocity observations, and planetary dynamics.

  • Elisabeth Adams (Senior Research Scientist, PSI) — Transit analysis, high-spatial resolution imaging and analysis
  • Michael Endl (Research Scientist, McDonald Observatory @ UT Austin) — Radial velocity observation and analysis
  • Jeffery Morgenthaler (Senior Research Scientist, PSI) — Transit observations
  • Amanda Sickafoose (Senior Research Scientist, PSI) — Transit observations

Funded Grants

  • “Finding the Next Doomed Worlds”, NASA’s Exoplanets Research Program — PI: Elisabeth Adams; Total Budget: $705,335
  • “Fossil Cores in the Kepler Data”, NASA’s Astrophysical Data Analysis Program (2013-2016) — PI: Brian Jackson; Total Budget: $271,200
  • “The Origins of Close-in Extrasolar Planets”, NASA’s Origins of Solar Systems (2013-2015) — PI: Kaloyan Penev; Total Budget: $104,000

Publications (*- student authors)

  • Ultra-short-period Planets in K2. III. Neighbors are Common with 13 New Multiplanet Systems and 10 Newly Validated Planets in Campaigns 0-8 and 10 — Adams, Elisabeth; Jackson, Brian; *Johnson, Samantha; et al. Planetary Sciences Journal, 2 152.
  • Ultra Short Period Planets in K2 with companions: a double transiting system for EPIC 220674823 — Adams, Elisabeth R.; Jackson, Brian; Endl, Michael; Cochran, William D.; MacQueen, Phillip J.; Duev, Dmitry A.; Jensen-Clem, Rebecca; Salama, Maïssa; Ziegler, Carl; Baranec, Christoph; Kulkarni, Shrinivas; Law, Nicholas M.; Riddle, Reed. eprint arXiv:1611.00397
  • 2016AJ….152…47A –Ultra-short-period Planets in K2 SuPerPiG Results for Campaigns 0-5 — Adams, Elisabeth R.; Jackson, Brian; Endl, Michael. The Astronomical Journal, Volume 152, Issue 2, article id. 47, 13 pp. (2016). Aug 2016.
  • 2013ApJ…779..165J — A Survey for Very Short-period Planets in the Kepler Data — Jackson, Brian; Stark, Christopher C.; Adams, Elisabeth R.; Chambers, John; Deming, Drake. The Astrophysical Journal, Volume 779, Issue 2, article id. 165, 12 pp. (2013). Dec 2013
  • 2013arXiv1309.1499J — Looking for Very Short-Period Planets with Re-Purposed Kepler — Jackson, Brian; eprint arXiv:1309.1499. Sep 2013
  • 2012ApJ…751…96P — Constraining Tidal Dissipation in Stars from the Destruction Rates of Exoplanets — Penev, Kaloyan; Jackson, Brian; Spada, Federico; Thom, Nicole; The Astrophysical Journal, Volume 751, Issue 2, article id. 96, 9 pp. (2012). Jun 2012

Press