Dynamic mineral clouds on HD 189733b II. Monte Carlo radiative transfer for 3D cloudy exoplanet atmospheres: combining scattering and emission spectra

TL;DR

This paper develops a Monte Carlo radiative transfer model to simulate 3D scattering and emission in the inhomogeneous cloud atmosphere of HD 189733b, aiding interpretation of observational data from telescopes like HST, Spitzer, TESS, and CHEOPS.

Contribution

It introduces a novel Monte Carlo radiative transfer code with variance reduction techniques for 3D exoplanet atmospheres, combining scattering and emission spectra based on cloud formation simulations.

Findings

Model predictions match HST and Spitzer secondary transit data.

Predicted geometric albedo values are consistent with optical polarimetry measurements.

Multiple scattering effects vary across the planet's hemisphere, influencing observable properties.

Abstract

As the 3D spatial properties of exoplanet atmospheres are being observed in increasing detail by current and new generations of telescopes, the modelling of the 3D scattering effects of cloud forming atmospheres with inhomogeneous opacity structures becomes increasingly important to interpret observational data. We model the scattering and emission properties of a simulated cloud forming, inhomogeneous opacity, hot Jupiter atmosphere of HD 189733b. We compare our results to available HST and Spitzer data and quantify the effects of 3D multiple-scattering on observable properties of the atmosphere. We discuss potential observational properties of HD 189733b for the upcoming TESS and CHEOPS missions. We develop a Monte Carlo radiative transfer code and apply it to post-process output of our 3D radiative-hydrodynamic, cloud formation simulation of HD 189733b. We employ three variance reduction techniques; next event estimation, survival biasing and composite emission biasing to improve signal-to-noise of the output.For cloud particle scattering events, a log-normal area distribution is constructed from the 3D cloud formation RHD results and stochastically sampled in order to model the Rayleigh and Mie scattering behaviour of a mixture of grain sizes. Stellar photon packets incident on the eastern dayside hemisphere show predominantly Rayleigh, single-scattering behaviour, while multiple-scattering occurs on the western hemisphere. Combined scattered and thermal emitted light predictions are consistent with published HST and Spitzer secondary transit observations. Our model predictions are also consistent with geometric albedo constraints from optical wavelength ground based polarimetry and HST B-band measurements. We predict an apparent geometric albedo for HD 189733b of 0.205 and 0.229, in the TESS and CHEOPS photometric bands respectively.