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Title: Point source polarimetry with the Gemini planet imager: Sensitivity characterization with T5.5 dwarf companion HD 19467 B

Abstract

Detecting polarized light from self-luminous exoplanets has the potential to provide key information about rotation, surface gravity, cloud grain size, and cloud coverage. While field brown dwarfs with detected polarized emission are common, no exoplanet or substellar companion has yet been detected in polarized light. With the advent of high contrast imaging spectro-polarimeters such as GPI and SPHERE, such a detection may now be possible with careful treatment of instrumental polarization. In this paper, we present 28 minutes of H-band GPI polarimetric observations of the benchmark T5.5 companion HD 19467 B. We detect no polarization signal from the target, and place an upper limit on the degree of linear polarization of $${p}_{\mathrm{CL}99.73\%}\leqslant 2.4\%$$. In conclusion, we discuss our results in the context of T dwarf cloud models and photometric variability.

Authors:
 [1]; ORCiD logo [2]; ORCiD logo [1];  [3];  [1]; ORCiD logo [4];  [5]; ORCiD logo [6]; ORCiD logo [7];  [8]; ORCiD logo [9]; ORCiD logo [10]; ORCiD logo [11]; ORCiD logo [12]; ORCiD logo [13]
  1. California Inst. of Technology (CalTech), Pasadena, CA (United States)
  2. Univ. of Toronto, Toronto, ON (Canada)
  3. Univ. of California, Berkeley, CA (United States)
  4. Stanford Univ., Palo Alto, CA (United States)
  5. Univ. of Exeter, Exeter (United Kingdom)
  6. Univ. of California, Santa Cruz, CA (United States)
  7. Space Telescope Science Institute, Baltimore, MD (United States)
  8. NASA Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, CA (United States)
  9. Univ. of California, Los Angeles, CA (United States)
  10. American Museum of Natural History, New York, NY (United States)
  11. Lawrence Livermore National Lab. (LLNL), Livermore, CA (United States)
  12. Gemini Observatory, La Serena (Chile)
  13. SETI Institute, Mountain View, CA (United States)
Publication Date:
Research Org.:
Lawrence Livermore National Lab. (LLNL), Livermore, CA (United States)
Sponsoring Org.:
USDOE
OSTI Identifier:
1324522
Report Number(s):
LLNL-JRNL-678637
Journal ID: ISSN 1538-4357
Grant/Contract Number:  
AC52-07NA27344
Resource Type:
Journal Article: Accepted Manuscript
Journal Name:
The Astrophysical Journal (Online)
Additional Journal Information:
Journal Volume: 820; Journal Issue: 2; Journal ID: ISSN 1538-4357
Publisher:
Institute of Physics (IOP)
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English
Subject:
79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS; brown dwarfs; stars: individual (HD 19467); techniques; high angular resolution; techniques: polarimetric

Citation Formats

Jensen-Clem, Rebecca, Millar-Blanchaer, Max, Mawet, Dimitri, Graham, James R., Wallace, J. Kent, Macintosh, Bruce, Hinkley, Sasha, Wiktorowicz, Sloane J., Perrin, Marshall D., Marley, Mark S., Fitzgerald, Michael P., Oppenheimer, Rebecca, Ammons, S. Mark, Rantakyrö, Fredrik T., and Marchis, Franck. Point source polarimetry with the Gemini planet imager: Sensitivity characterization with T5.5 dwarf companion HD 19467 B. United States: N. p., 2016. Web. doi:10.3847/0004-637X/820/2/111.
Jensen-Clem, Rebecca, Millar-Blanchaer, Max, Mawet, Dimitri, Graham, James R., Wallace, J. Kent, Macintosh, Bruce, Hinkley, Sasha, Wiktorowicz, Sloane J., Perrin, Marshall D., Marley, Mark S., Fitzgerald, Michael P., Oppenheimer, Rebecca, Ammons, S. Mark, Rantakyrö, Fredrik T., & Marchis, Franck. Point source polarimetry with the Gemini planet imager: Sensitivity characterization with T5.5 dwarf companion HD 19467 B. United States. https://doi.org/10.3847/0004-637X/820/2/111
Jensen-Clem, Rebecca, Millar-Blanchaer, Max, Mawet, Dimitri, Graham, James R., Wallace, J. Kent, Macintosh, Bruce, Hinkley, Sasha, Wiktorowicz, Sloane J., Perrin, Marshall D., Marley, Mark S., Fitzgerald, Michael P., Oppenheimer, Rebecca, Ammons, S. Mark, Rantakyrö, Fredrik T., and Marchis, Franck. 2016. "Point source polarimetry with the Gemini planet imager: Sensitivity characterization with T5.5 dwarf companion HD 19467 B". United States. https://doi.org/10.3847/0004-637X/820/2/111. https://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/1324522.
@article{osti_1324522,
title = {Point source polarimetry with the Gemini planet imager: Sensitivity characterization with T5.5 dwarf companion HD 19467 B},
author = {Jensen-Clem, Rebecca and Millar-Blanchaer, Max and Mawet, Dimitri and Graham, James R. and Wallace, J. Kent and Macintosh, Bruce and Hinkley, Sasha and Wiktorowicz, Sloane J. and Perrin, Marshall D. and Marley, Mark S. and Fitzgerald, Michael P. and Oppenheimer, Rebecca and Ammons, S. Mark and Rantakyrö, Fredrik T. and Marchis, Franck},
abstractNote = {Detecting polarized light from self-luminous exoplanets has the potential to provide key information about rotation, surface gravity, cloud grain size, and cloud coverage. While field brown dwarfs with detected polarized emission are common, no exoplanet or substellar companion has yet been detected in polarized light. With the advent of high contrast imaging spectro-polarimeters such as GPI and SPHERE, such a detection may now be possible with careful treatment of instrumental polarization. In this paper, we present 28 minutes of H-band GPI polarimetric observations of the benchmark T5.5 companion HD 19467 B. We detect no polarization signal from the target, and place an upper limit on the degree of linear polarization of ${p}_{\mathrm{CL}99.73\%}\leqslant 2.4\%$. In conclusion, we discuss our results in the context of T dwarf cloud models and photometric variability.},
doi = {10.3847/0004-637X/820/2/111},
url = {https://www.osti.gov/biblio/1324522}, journal = {The Astrophysical Journal (Online)},
issn = {1538-4357},
number = 2,
volume = 820,
place = {United States},
year = {Tue Mar 29 00:00:00 EDT 2016},
month = {Tue Mar 29 00:00:00 EDT 2016}
}

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Cited by: 19 works
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Works referenced in this record:

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journal, September 2015


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Detection and Characterization of Exoplanets and Disks Using Projections on Karhunen-LoÈVe Eigenimages
journal, August 2012


On the envelope and phase distributions for correlated gaussian quadratures
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Near-Infrared Linear Polarization of Ultracool Dwarfs
journal, September 2011


Direct Imaging of Multiple Planets Orbiting the Star HR 8799
journal, November 2008


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journal, May 2007


Polarimetry with the Gemini Planet Imager: Methods, Performance at First Light, and the Circumstellar ring Around hr 4796a
journal, January 2015


CLOUDS AND CHEMISTRY IN THE ATMOSPHERE OF EXTRASOLAR PLANET HR8799b
journal, May 2011


Confidence Level and Sensitivity Limits in High‐Contrast Imaging
journal, January 2008


Linear polarization of rapidly rotating ultracool dwarfs
journal, August 2013


HST SPECTRAL MAPPING OF L/T TRANSITION BROWN DWARFS REVEALS CLOUD THICKNESS VARIATIONS
journal, April 2013


Observations of Brown Dwarfs
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THE FIRST H -BAND SPECTRUM OF THE GIANT PLANET β PICTORIS b
journal, December 2014


Probing Dust in the Atmosphere of Brown Dwarfs through Polarization
journal, November 2001


Polarisation of very-low-mass stars and brown dwarfs: I. VLT/FORS1 optical observations of field ultra-cool dwarfs
journal, June 2009


NEAR-INFRARED SPECTROSCOPY OF THE EXTRASOLAR PLANET HR 8799 b
journal, October 2010


Optical linear polarization in ultra cool dwarfs: A tool to probe dust in the ultra cool dwarf atmospheres
journal, October 2009


Large-Amplitude Variations of an l/t Transition Brown Dwarf: Multi-Wavelength Observations of Patchy, High-Contrast Cloud Features
journal, April 2012


Strong Brightness Variations Signal Cloudy-To-Clear Transition of Brown Dwarfs
journal, September 2014


Photometric Variability of the t2.5 Brown Dwarf simp J013656.5+093347: Evidence for Evolving Weather Patterns
journal, August 2009


Optical Linear Polarization of Late M and L Type Dwarfs
journal, March 2005


The Trends High-Contrast Imaging Survey. v. Discovery of an old and cold Benchmark T-Dwarf Orbiting the Nearby G-Star hd 19467
journal, January 2014


Spectropolarimetric signatures of Earth-like extrasolar planets
journal, March 2008


Probing the physical properties of directly imaged gas giant exoplanets through polarization: Polarization of directly imaged exoplanets
journal, September 2011


GEMINI PLANET IMAGER SPECTROSCOPY OF THE HR 8799 PLANETS c AND d
journal, September 2014


First light of the Gemini Planet Imager
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journal, January 2011

  • Hinkley, Sasha; Oppenheimer, Ben R.; Zimmerman, Neil
  • Publications of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific, Vol. 123, Issue 899
  • https://doi.org/10.1086/658163

The Solar‐System‐Scale Disk around AB Aurigae
journal, June 2008


Discovery of the Brightest T Dwarf in the Northern Hemisphere
journal, October 2006


Fundamental Limitations of high Contrast Imaging set by Small Sample Statistics
journal, August 2014


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Gemini planet imager observational calibrations VII: on-sky polarimetric performance of the Gemini planet imager
conference, July 2014


Data reduction pipeline for the Gemini Planet Imager
conference, July 2010


Gemini Planet Imager observational calibrations I: Overview of the GPI data reduction pipeline
conference, July 2014


Optical linear polarimetry of ultra cool dwarfs
journal, December 2002


Temperature Fluctuations as a Source of Brown Dwarf Variability
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Direct Spectrum of the Benchmark t Dwarf hd 19467 b
journal, January 2015


Discovery and spectroscopy of the young jovian planet 51 Eri b with the Gemini Planet Imager
journal, August 2015


Speckle Suppression Through dual Imaging Polarimetry, and a Ground-Based Image of the hr 4796a Circumstellar disk
journal, July 2009


Works referencing / citing this record:

Polarimetric imaging mode of VLT/SPHERE/IRDIS: II. Characterization and correction of instrumental polarization effects,
journal, January 2020


Imaging Extrasolar Giant Planets
journal, August 2016


WIRC+Pol: A Low-resolution Near-infrared Spectropolarimeter
journal, December 2018


Gemini Planet Imager observational calibrations XI: pipeline improvements and enhanced calibrations after two years on sky
conference, August 2016


Complex Spiral Structure in the HD 100546 Transitional Disk as Revealed by GPI and MagAO
journal, May 2017


GPI Spectroscopy of the Mass, Age, and Metallicity Benchmark Brown Dwarf HD 4747 B
journal, February 2018


Polarimetric imaging mode of VLT/SPHERE/IRDIS: I. Description, data reduction, and observing strategy
journal, January 2020


GPI Spectroscopy of the Mass, Age, and Metallicity Benchmark Brown Dwarf HD 4747 B
text, January 2018


WIRC+Pol: a low-resolution near-infrared spectropolarimeter
text, January 2018