CAREER: Planet Formation at High Resolution

University Of California-San Diego, La Jolla CA

Investigators

Abstract

The team will conduct high-resolution optical and spectroscopic surveys of young planetary systems in an attempt to directly image and collect high-resolution spectra of hot Jovian-mass planets. The team will use the upgraded Gemini Planetary Imager (GPI 2.0) on the Gemini North telescope and the HISPEC high-resolution spectrometer on the Keck II telescope. They will obtain the first high-resolution spectra of forming gas giant planets, offering a pristine view of their atmospheric structure and abundances. The team will also develop a novel educational component for undergraduate astronomy courses based on a planetarium-based program. The GPI 2.0 optical survey will target very young stars in nearby star-forming regions in Taurus and Rho Ophiuchus. It will be the most sensitive direct imaging survey ever conducted in this region. Using the demographic information discovered in the first iteration of GPI, the team expects to detect as many as 10 new exoplanets during the epoch of formation, constraining the timescale of formation, migration, accretion histories, and planet-disk interactions. Follow-up observations with the HISPEC spectrometer on the Keck II Telescope will provide R~100,000 spectra across the entire near-infrared wavelength regime (0.9-2.5 μm). The team will investigate predicted science performance for the instrument and provide targets from GPI 2.0 for first-light observations with HISPEC in 2024. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.