THE HIGH ALBEDO OF THE HOT JUPITER KEPLER-7 b

Demory, Brice-Olivier; Seager, Sara; Madhusudhan, Nikku; Kjeldsen, Hans; Christensen-Dalsgaard, Jørgen; Gillon, Michaël; Rowe, Jason F.; Welsh, William F.; Adams, Elisabeth R.; Dupree, Andrea; McCarthy, Don; Kulesa, Craig; Borucki, William J.; Koch, David G. (2011). THE HIGH ALBEDO OF THE HOT JUPITER KEPLER-7 b. Astrophysical Journal Letters, 735(1), L12. Institute of Physics Publishing IOP 10.1088/2041-8205/735/1/l12

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Hot Jupiters are expected to be dark from both observations (albedo upper limits) and theory (alkali metals and/or TiO and VO absorption). However, only a handful of hot Jupiters have been observed with high enough photometric precision at visible wavelengths to investigate these expectations. The NASA Kepler mission provides a means to widen the sample and to assess the extent to which hot Jupiter albedos are low. We present a global analysis of Kepler-7 b based on Q0–Q4 data, published radial velocities, and asteroseismology constraints. We measure an occultation depth in the Kepler bandpass of 44 ± 5 ppm. If directly related to the albedo, this translates to a Kepler geometric albedo of 0.32 ± 0.03, the most precise value measured so far for an exoplanet. We also characterize the planetary orbital phase light curve with an amplitude of 42 ± 4 ppm. Using atmospheric models, we find it unlikely that the high albedo is due to a dominant thermal component and propose two solutions to explain the observed planetary flux. First, we interpret the Kepler-7 b albedo as resulting from an excess reflection over what can be explained solely by Rayleigh scattering, along with a nominal thermal component. This excess reflection might indicate the presence of a cloud or haze layer in the atmosphere, motivating new modeling and observational efforts. Alternatively, the albedo can be explained by Rayleigh scattering alone if Na and K are depleted in the atmosphere by a factor of 10–100 below solar abundances.

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