Molecular Opacities: Application to the Giant Planets
نویسندگان
چکیده
Present available interior models of giant planets assume that the internal transport of energy is entirely convective and, accordingly, rule out any possibility of radiative transport. New opacity calculations at temperatures and densities occurring within the giant planets, taking into account H2H2 and H2-He collision-induced absorption as well as infrared and visible absorption due to hydrogen, water, methane and ammonia are presented. These opacities are not high enough to exclude the presence of a. radiative zone in the molecular H2 envelope of Jupiter, Saturn and Uranus.
منابع مشابه
Line and Mean Opacities for Ultracool Dwarfs and Extrasolar Planets
Opacities and chemical abundance data are crucial ingredients of ultracool dwarf and extrasolar giant planet atmosphere models. We report here on the detailed sources of molecular opacity data employed by our group for this application. We also present tables of Rosseland and Planck mean opacities which are of use in some studies of the atmospheres, interiors, and evolution of planets and brown...
متن کاملThe Theory of Brown Dwarfs and Extrasolar Giant Planets
Straddling the traditional realms of the planets and the stars, objects below the edge of the main sequence have such unique properties, and are being discovered in such quantities, that one can rightly claim that a new field at the interface of planetary science and astronomy is being born. In this review, we explore the essential elements of the theory of brown dwarfs and giant planets, as we...
متن کاملAtomic and Molecular Opacities for Brown Dwarf and Giant Planet Atmospheres
We present a comprehensive description of the theory and practice of opacity calculations from the infrared to the ultraviolet needed to generate models of the atmospheres of brown dwarfs and extrasolar giant planets. Methods for using existing line lists and spectroscopic databases in disparate formats are presented and plots of the resulting absorptive opacities versus wavelength for the most...
متن کاملThe composition of transiting giant extrasolar planets
In principle, the combined measurements of the mass and radius a giant exoplanet allow one to determine the relative fraction of hydrogen and helium and of heavy elements in the planet. However, uncertainties on the underlying physics imply that some known transiting planets appear anomalously large, and this generally prevent any firm conclusion when a planet is considered on an individual bas...
متن کاملInfrared Light Curves and the Detectability of Close-In Extrasolar Giant Planets
We compute theoretical infrared light curves for several known extrasolar planets. We have constructed a set of routines to calculate the orbital parameters for a given planet and integrate over the planetary disk to determine the total flux density of the planet as it orbits the parent star. We have further developed a spectral synthesis routine to calculate theoretical spectra of extrasolar g...
متن کامل