A Case for an Atmosphere on Super-Earth 55 Cancri e
Isabel Angelo, Renyu Hu

TL;DR
This study uses infrared phase curve data to demonstrate that super-Earth 55 Cancri e likely possesses a substantial atmosphere, as evidenced by heat redistribution patterns inconsistent with a bare-rock surface.
Contribution
It introduces a semi-analytical model to analyze phase curves, providing evidence for an atmosphere on 55 Cancri e based on heat transport efficiency.
Findings
Heat redistribution efficiency ~1.47 suggests a substantial atmosphere.
Phase curve shows eastward-shifted hot spot indicating atmospheric heat transport.
Atmospheric pressure estimated at ~1.4 bar.
Abstract
One of the primary questions when characterizing Earth-sized and super-Earth-sized exoplanets is whether they have a substantial atmosphere like Earth and Venus or a bare-rock surface like Mercury. Phase curves of the planets in thermal emission provide clues to this question, because a substantial atmosphere would transport heat more efficiently than a bare-rock surface. Analyzing phase curve photometric data around secondary eclipse has previously been used to study energy transport in the atmospheres of hot Jupiters. Here we use phase curve, Spitzer time-series photometry to study the thermal emission properties of the super-Earth exoplanet 55 Cancri e. We utilize a semi-analytical framework to fit a physical model to the infrared photometric data at 4.5 micron. The model uses parameters of planetary properties including Bond albedo, heat redistribution efficiency (i.e., ratio…
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