Interstellar Updates

 

These are items of interest to the interstellar exploration community that we’ve found in our quest for information that will help us advance toward our goals.  If you know of anything we’ve overlooked, or any sources of such information we should monitor, or if you would like to be added to our IRG-updates mailing list and receive these updates in you email every weekday, please send that information to info@irg.space.

You can now search our database of interstellar updates and find items of interest to you.

September 21, 2020 updates

π Earth: A 3.14 day Earth-sized Planet from K2’s Kitchen Served Warm by the SPECULOOS Team
https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/1538-3881/aba95f

Circular Binary Star and an Interstellar Interloper: The Analytical Solution
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1384107620303377

MOA-2009-BLG-319Lb: A Sub-Saturn Planet Inside the Predicted Mass Desert
https://arxiv.org/abs/2009.08461

ACCESS: Confirmation of no potassium in the atmosphere of WASP-31b
https://arxiv.org/abs/2009.08472

RoadRunner: a fast and flexible exoplanet transit model
https://arxiv.org/abs/2009.08500

Multi-orbital-phase and multi-band characterization of exoplanetary atmospheres with reflected light spectra
https://arxiv.org/abs/2009.08579

Oumuamuas passing through molecular clouds
https://arxiv.org/abs/2009.08773

TOI-481 b & TOI-892 b: Two long period hot Jupiters from the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite
https://arxiv.org/abs/2009.08881

WASP-117 b: an eccentric hot-Saturn as a future complex chemistry laboratory
https://arxiv.org/abs/2009.08916

Novel Technosignatures
https://arxiv.org/abs/2009.08873

September 17, 2020 updates

A giant planet candidate transiting a white dwarf
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-020-2713-y

The White Dwarf Opportunity: Robust Detections of Molecules in Earth-like Exoplanet Atmospheres with the James Webb Space Telescope
https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/2041-8213/aba9d3

Exploration of trans-Neptunian objects using the Direct Fusion Drive
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0094576520305610

Abundant atmospheric methane from volcanism on terrestrial planets is unlikely and strengthens the case for methane as a biosignature
https://arxiv.org/abs/2009.07761

On The Biomass Required To Produce Phosphine Detected In The Cloud Decks Of Venus
https://arxiv.org/abs/2009.07835

September 16, 2020 updates

GJ 357 b – A super-Earth orbiting an extremely inactive host star
https://www.aanda.org/articles/aa/abs/2020/09/aa38280-20/aa38280-20.html

An Increase in Small-planet Occurrence with Metallicity for Late-type Dwarf Stars in the Kepler Field and Its Implications for Planet Formation
https://arxiv.org/abs/2009.06638

Revisiting the Architecture of the KOI-89 System
https://arxiv.org/abs/2009.06850

An exact, generalised Laplace resonance in the HR 8799 planetary system
https://arxiv.org/abs/2009.07006

An Earth-like stellar wind environment for Proxima Centauri c
https://arxiv.org/abs/2009.07266

September 15, 2020 updates

Life in Extreme Environments: Insights in Biological Capability – Chapter 13: Analytical astrobiology: the search for life signatures and the remote detection of biomarkers through their Raman spectral interrogation
https://www.amazon.com/Life-Extreme-Environments-Biological-Capability-ebook/dp/B08GG9S318/

Fine-Tuning in the Physical Universe – Chapter 12: On the Temporal Habitability of Our Universe
https://www.amazon.com/Fine-Tuning-Physical-Universe-David-Sloan-ebook/dp/B08GG9RHHG/

Phosphine gas in the cloud decks of Venus
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41550-020-1174-4

A search for He I airglow emission from the hot Jupiter tau Boo b
https://arxiv.org/abs/2009.05821

Discriminating between hazy and clear hot-Jupiter atmospheres with CARMENES
https://arxiv.org/abs/2009.06280

The Venusian Lower Atmosphere Haze as a Depot for Desiccated Microbial Life: A Proposed Life Cycle for Persistence of the Venusian Aerial Biosphere
https://arxiv.org/abs/2009.06474

Phosphine on Venus Cannot be Explained by Conventional Processes
https://arxiv.org/abs/2009.06499

Two Planets Straddling the Habitable Zone of The Nearby K dwarf Gl 414A
https://arxiv.org/abs/2009.06503

September 14, 2020 updates

Characterization of the K2-38 planetary system – Unraveling one of the densest planets known to date
https://www.aanda.org/articles/aa/abs/2020/09/aa38187-20/aa38187-20.html

An ATA Search for a Repetition of the Wow Signal
https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/1538-3881/aba58f

A Search for Rotation Periods in 1000 TESS Objects of Interest
https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/1538-4365/aba73f

What limits photosynthesis? Identifying the thermodynamic constraints of the terrestrial biosphere within the Earth system
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0005272820301535

The impact of life on climate stabilisation over different timescales
https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/2020GC009105

Reflected Light Observations of the Galilean Satellites from Cassini: a testbed for cold terrestrial exoplanets
https://arxiv.org/abs/2009.05467