Transit Detection of Radial Velocity Planets

TL;DR

This paper analyzes how orbital parameters influence the transit probability of radial velocity planets, revealing unexpectedly high chances for long-period planets and providing methods to interpret null detection results.

Contribution

It offers a quantitative analysis of orbital parameters affecting transit probability and applies this to known planets, highlighting potential for discovering transits at longer periods.

Findings

High transit probabilities for some long-period planets.

Quantitative relationship between orbital parameters and transit likelihood.

Method to interpret null results in transit surveys.

Abstract

The orbital parameters of extra-solar planets have a significant impact on the probability that the planet will transit the host star. This was recently demonstrated by the transit detection of HD 17156b whose favourable eccentricity and argument of periastron dramatically increased its transit likelihood. We present a study which provides a quantitative analysis of how these two orbital parameters effect the geometric transit probability as a function of period. Further, we apply these results to known radial velocity planets and show that there are unexpectedly high transit probabilities for planets at relatively long periods. For a photometric monitoring campaign which aims to determine if the planet indeed transits, we calculate the significance of a null result and the subsequent constraints that may be applied to orbital parameters.