A High Contrast Survey for Extrasolar Giant Planets with the Simultaneous Differential Imager (SDI)
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
A High Contrast Survey for Extrasolar Giant Planets with the Simultaneous Differential Imager (SDI) Item Type text; Electronic Dissertation Authors Biller, Beth Alison Publisher The University of Arizona. Rights Copyright © is held by the author. Digital access to this material is made possible by the University Libraries, University of Arizona. Further transmission, reproduction or presentation (such as public display or performance) of protected items is prohibited except with permission of the author. Download date 03/10/2021 23:58:44 Link to Item http://hdl.handle.net/10150/194542 A HIGH CONTRAST SURVEY FOR EXTRASOLAR GIANT PLANETS WITH THE SIMULTANEOUS DIFFERENTIAL IMAGER (SDI) by Beth Alison Biller A Dissertation Submitted to the Faculty of the DEPARTMENT OF ASTRONOMY In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements For the Degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY In the Graduate College THE UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA 2 0 0 7 2 THE UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA GRADUATE COLLEGE As members of the Dissertation Committee, we certify that we have read the dis- sertation prepared by Beth Alison Biller entitled “A High Contrast Survey for Extrasolar Giant Planets with the Simultaneous Differential Imager (SDI)” and recommend that it be accepted as fulfilling the dissertation requirement for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Date: June 29, 2007 Laird Close Date: June 29, 2007 Don McCarthy Date: June 29, 2007 John Bieging Date: June 29, 2007 Glenn Schneider Final approval and acceptance of this dissertation is contingent upon the candi- date's submission of the final copies of the dissertation to the Graduate College. I hereby certify that I have read this dissertation prepared under my direction and recommend that it be accepted as fulfilling the dissertation requirement. Date: June 29, 2007 Dissertation Director: Laird Close 3 STATEMENT BY AUTHOR This dissertation has been submitted in partial fulfillment of requirements for an advanced degree at The University of Arizona and is deposited in the Univer- sity Library to be made available to borrowers under rules of the Library. Brief quotations from this dissertation are allowable without special permis- sion, provided that accurate acknowledgment of source is made. Requests for permission for extended quotation from or reproduction of this manuscript in whole or in part may be granted by the head of the major department or the Dean of the Graduate College when in his or her judgment the proposed use of the material is in the interests of scholarship. In all other instances, however, permission must be obtained from the author. SIGNED: Beth Alison Biller 4 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Science is above all else a collaborative enterprise. First of all, huge thanks to my advisor, Laird Close, for his patience and unwavering support. I would also like to thank the many other scientific collaborators (including my thesis committee) I've worked with over the course of this thesis: Eric Nielsen, Don Mc- Carthy, Karl Stapelfeldt, Michael Liu, Markus Kasper, Wolfgang Brandner, Rainer Lenzen, Elena Masciadri, Thomas Henning, Markus Hartung, John Trauger, Eric Mamajek, Aigen Li, Massimo Marengo, John Bieging, Glenn Schneider, Phil Hinz, William Hoffman, Guido Brusa, Douglas Miller, Stephan Kellner, Craig Kulesa, Matthew Kenworthy, Michael Lloyd-Hart, Francois Wildi, Dan Potter, and Ben Oppenheimer. Thanks to the supportive Steward community past and present, including but hardly limited to Iva Momcheva, Jane Rigby, Kim Chapman, Doris Tucker, Michelle Cournoyer, Erin Carlson, Catalina Diaz-Silva, Karen Knierman, Abby Hedden, Wayne Schlingman, Jeff Fookson, Neal Lauver, Janice Lee, Lei Bai, Patrick Young, Jackie Monkiewicz, Eric Nielsen, Kristian Finlator, Moire Prescott, Chien Peng, Matt Kenworthy, Vidya Vaitheeswaran, John Codona, Dave Sudarsky, and Tami Rogers. Thanks to Ry for reading more drafts of this thesis than anyone else – some people have a personal trainer, I'm lucky to have a personal editor. I gratefully acknowledge financial support from NASA through the Graduate Student Researchers Program and future support through the Hubble Fellowship Program. Thanks to my family, as always... after only 29 years, I'm finally getting a job. And thanks to my Tucson “family” as well – Hayley, Jillian, Lori, Jeremy, Teresa, Charleen, Doug, Ching, Brandye, Emma, Fonda, Lori, Raven, Monica, Amy, Georgia, Buzz, Lana, Ziva, Susan, Erika, Taylor, Trinity, Madeline, Sarah, and many, many others. You know who you are. 5 DEDICATION To my grandmother, Rosagene Baron. To my parents and brother, Larry, Sari, and Alan Biller. To the amazing women of Midriff Crisis – Brandye, Emma, Fonda, Lori, Raven, Monica, and Amy. And, last but certainly not least, to Ry. He's already dedicated a play to me. It's time I caught up. 6 TABLE OF CONTENTS LIST OF FIGURES . 8 LIST OF TABLES . 10 ABSTRACT . 11 CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : 13 1.1 Many Planets, Few Photons – the Importance of Direct Detection . 14 1.2 The Difficulty of Direct Detection . 16 1.3 What this Thesis Contains . 21 CHAPTER 2 AN IMAGING SURVEY FOR EXTRASOLAR PLANETS AROUND 45 CLOSE, YOUNG STARS WITH SDI AT THE VLT AND MMT : : : : : : : : 24 2.1 Introduction . 24 2.2 The Simultaneous Differential Imagers at the VLT and MMT . 27 2.2.1 Hardware Considerations . 27 2.2.2 Discoveries with the SDI Cameras . 28 2.2.3 Observational Techniques and Data Reduction . 28 2.3 The SDI Survey . 34 2.3.1 Survey Design / Target Selection . 34 2.3.2 The Performance of the SDI Filters as Spectral Indices . 36 2.3.3 Contrast Limits and Minimum Detectable Planet Separation 39 2.3.4 Survey Completeness . 53 2.3.5 Sensitivity Case Study: AB Dor with Simulated Planets . 55 2.3.6 Comparison with Other Direct Detection Methods . 56 2.3.7 New and Confirmed Close Binary Stars . 57 2.3.8 Candidate Identification / Elimination . 58 2.3.9 Planet Detectability . 58 2.4 Conclusions . 62 CHAPTER 3 DISCOVERY OF A VERY NEARBY BROWN DWARF TO THE SUN: A METHANE RICH BROWN DWARF COMPANION TO THE LOW MASS STAR SCR 1845-6357 : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : 121 3.1 Introduction . 121 3.2 Observations and Data Reduction . 122 3.3 Results and Discussion . 123 3.3.1 Spectral Type . 124 3.3.2 H magnitude . 125 3.3.3 Likelihood of Being a Bound Companion and T Dwarf Num- ber Densities . 126 3.3.4 Mass Estimate for SCR 1845B . 128 7 TABLE OF CONTENTS — Continued 3.4 Conclusions . 128 CHAPTER 4 HIGH RESOLUTION MID - INFRARED IMAGING OF THE AGB STAR RV BOO WITH THE STEWARD OBSERVATORY ADAPTIVE OPTICS SYS- TEM : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : 132 4.1 Introduction / Application to Planet-finding Science . 132 4.2 Circumstellar Structure around Asymptotic Giant Branch Stars . 132 4.3 Observations and Data Reduction . 135 4.4 Followup Observations . 140 4.5 Analysis . 141 4.6 Discussion . 145 4.7 Conclusions . 148 CHAPTER 5 PRELIMINARY RESULTS OF A MULTI-WAVELENGTH DIFFEREN- TIAL IMAGING EXPERIMENT FOR THE HIGH CONTRAST IMAGING TESTBED158 5.1 Introduction / Motivation . 158 5.2 Data Acquisition and Reduction . 161 5.3 Analysis . 162 5.4 Conclusions . 165 CHAPTER 6 CONCLUSIONS AND FUTURE DIRECTIONS : : : : : : : : : : : 182 6.1 Conclusions from the SDI Imaging Survey for Extrasolar Planets and Ramifications for Future Planet Imaging Surveys . 182 6.2 Development of Technology for Future Planet Searches . 184 6.2.1 High Strehls . 184 6.2.2 High Strehls and High Contrasts . 185 REFERENCES : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : 188 8 LIST OF FIGURES 1.1 Schematic of a Typical AO System . 19 2.1 SDI filters . 32 2.2 Raw VLT SDI data . 33 2.3 Reduced VLT SDI data . 35 2.4 Age vs. Distance . 37 2.5 SDI methane spectral indices for the T dwarfs SCR 1845B, Gl 229B, ² Ind Ba, and ² Ind Bb . 40 2.6 Comparison of Contrast Curves generated in 3 different manners for a set of 6 typical program stars . 44 2.7 Sensitivity curve for DX Leo . 45 2.8 Sensitivity vs. Separation . 46 2.9 Sensitivity vs. Separation . 47 2.10 Sensitivity vs. Separation . 48 2.11 Contrasts for VLT survey objects with H < 4.5 . 64 2.12 Contrasts for VLT survey objects with 5.5 > H > 4.5 . 65 2.13 Contrasts for VLT survey objects with 6.5 > H > 5.5 . 66 2.14 Contrasts for VLT survey objects with 7.5 > H >6.5 . 67 2.15 Contrasts for VLT survey objects with H >7.5 . 68 2.16 Contrasts for MMT survey objects observed in May 2005 . 69 2.17 Contrasts for MMT survey objects observed in February 2006 . 70 2.18 FWHM vs. Contrast at 0.5” . 71 2.19 Minimum Separations . 72 2.20 Contour Plots . 73 2.21 50% completeness plot . 82 2.22 Reduced VLT SDI data . 83 2.23 Maximum Achievable Planet Contrast vs. Separation . 84 2.24 Maximum achievable H band planet contrast vs. separation . 85 2.25 Minimum Detectable Planet Mass vs. Separation . 86 2.26 Comparison with other direct detection methods . 87 2.27 Minimum Detectable Mass vs. Separation . 88 2.28 Expected number of planets detected . 97 3.1 An SDI image of SCR 1845 . 130 3.2 Images of SCR 1845 using the SDI device and reduced using a cus- tom SDI pipeline . 131 4.1 9.8, 11.7, and 18 ¹m images of the PSF stars AC Her, ¹ UMa, and ® Her as observed at the MMT . 150 4.2 The 11.7 ¹m PSF of AC Her before and after PSF subtraction . 151 9 4.3 AO Images of RV Boo, ¹ UMa, ® Her, and AC Her at 9.8 ¹m . 152 4.4 Position angle of the semi-major axis vs. time (after first observa- tion) for deconvolved RV Boo and ¹ UMa nod images . 153 4.5 Eccentricity vs. PSF FWHM for RV Boo, ¹ UMa, ® Her, and AC Her images . 154 4.6 Deconvolved image of RV Boo .