A $5M_\text{Jup}$ Non-Transiting Coplanar Circumbinary Planet Around Kepler-1660AB

TL;DR

This study confirms a $5M_{Jup}$ coplanar circumbinary planet around Kepler-1660AB using radial velocities and eclipse data, challenging previous claims of a highly misaligned orbit, and demonstrating ETVs as effective detection methods.

Contribution

First radial velocity measurement of Kepler-1660AB combined with ETV and eclipse depth analysis, confirming a coplanar circumbinary planet and refuting earlier misaligned orbit hypotheses.

Findings

Confirmed a 239.5-day circumbinary planet with 4.87 M_Jup

Ruled out previous misaligned orbit models due to lack of eclipse depth variations

Demonstrated ETVs as a viable method for detecting non-transiting circumbinary planets

Abstract

Over a dozen transiting circumbinary planets have been discovered around eclipsing binaries. Transit detections are biased towards aligned planet and binary orbits, and indeed all of the known planets have mutual inclinations less than $4.5^{\circ}$. One path to discovering circumbinary planets with misaligned orbits is through eclipse timing variations (ETVs) of non-transiting planets. Borkovits et al. (2016) discovered ETVs on the 18.6 d binary Kepler-1660AB, indicative of a third body on a $\approx 236$ d period, with a misaligned orbit and a potentially planetary mass. Getley et al. (2017) agreed with the planetary hypothesis, arguing for a $7.7M_{\rm Jup}$ circumbinary planet on an orbit that is highly misaligned by $120^{\circ}$ with respect to the binary. In this paper, we obtain the first radial velocities of the binary. We combine these with an analysis of not only the ETVs but also the eclipse depth variations. We confirm the existence of a $239.5$ d circumbinary planet, but with a lower mass of $4.87M_{\rm Jup}$ and a coplanar orbit. The misaligned orbits proposed by previous authors are definitively ruled out by a lack of eclipse depth variations. Kepler-1660ABb is the first confirmed circumbinary planet found using ETVs around a main sequence binary.