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      Analytic Lightcurves for Planetary Transit Searches

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          Abstract

          We present exact analytic formulae for the eclipse of a star described by quadratic or nonlinear limb darkening. In the limit that the planet radius is less than a tenth of the stellar radius, we show that the exact lightcurve can be well approximated by assuming the region of the star blocked by the planet has constant surface brightness. We apply these results to the HST observations of HD 209458, showing that the ratio of the planetary to stellar radii is 0.1207+-0.0003. These formulae give a fast and accurate means of computing lightcurves using limb-darkening coefficients from model atmospheres which should aid in the detection, simulation, and parameter fitting of planetary transits.

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          Author and article information

          Journal
          03 October 2002
          Article
          10.1086/345520
          astro-ph/0210099
          25405eb2-6617-48d6-9851-091f21ed8316
          History
          Custom metadata
          Astrophys.J.580:L171-L176,2002
          4 pages, 2 figures, emulateapj, accepted for publication in ApJ Letters, subroutines available at http://www.pha.jhu.edu/~agol
          astro-ph

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