Probing Transit Timing Variation and Its Possible Origin with 12 New Transits of TrES-3b

Journal Article · Wed Jul 01 00:00:00 EDT 2020 · Astronomical Journal (New York, N.Y. Online)

DOI:https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-3881/AB9818· OSTI ID:23013278

Mannaday, Vineet Kumar; Thakur, Parijat ^[1]; Jiang, Ing-Guey; Su, Li-Hsin; Sariya, Devesh P. ^[2]; Sahu, D. K. ^[3]; Joshi, Y. C.; Pandey, A. K.; Joshi, Santosh ^[4]; Yadav, Ram Kesh; Mkrtichian, David ^[5]; Yeh, Li-Chin ^[6]; Griv, Evgeny ^[7]; Shlyapnikov, Aleksey; Moskvin, Vasilii; Ignatov, Vladimir ^[8]; Vaňko, M. ^[9]

---

1. Department of Pure and Applied Physics, Guru Ghasidas Vishwavidyalaya (A Central University), Bilaspur (C.G.)-495 009 (India)
2. Department of Physics and Institute of Astronomy, National Tsing-Hua University, Hsinchu, Taiwan (China)
3. Indian Institute of Astrophysics, Bangalore-560 034 (India)
4. Aryabhatta Research Institute of Observational Sciences (ARIES), Manora Peak, Nainital-263 002 (India)
5. National Astronomical Research Institute of Thailand (NARIT), Sirindhorn AstroPark, 260 Moo 4, T. Donkaew, A. Maerim, Chiangmai, 50180 (Thailand)
6. Institute of Computational and Modeling Science, National Tsing-Hua University, Hsinchu, Taiwan (China)
7. Department of Physics, Ben-Gurion University, Beer-Sheva 84105 (Israel)
8. Crimean Astrophysical Observatory, 298409, Nauchny, Crimea (Country Unknown)
9. Astronomical Institute, Slovak Academy of Sciences, SK-059 60 Tatranská Lomnica (Slovakia)

We present 12 new transit light curves of the hot-Jupiter TrES-3b observed during 2012−2018 to probe the transit timing variation (TTV). By combining the midtransit times determined from these 12 transit data with those reestimated through uniform procedure from 71 transit data available in the literature, we derive new linear ephemeris and obtain the timing residuals that suggest the possibility of TTV in the TrES-3 system. However, the frequency analysis shows that the possible TTV is unlikely to be periodic, indicating the absence of an additional body in this system. To explore the other possible origins of TTV, the orbital decay and apsidal precession ephemeris models are fitted to the transit time data. We find the decay rate of TrES-3b to be P-dot {sub q}=−4.1±3.1 ms yr{sup −1}, and the corresponding estimated modified stellar tidal quality factor of Q{sub ∗}{sup ′}∼1.11×10{sup 5} is consistent with the theoretically predicted values for the stars hosting the hot-Jupiters. The shift in the transit arrival time of TrES-3b after 11 years is expected to be T {sub shift} ∼ 69.55 s, which is consistent with the rms of the timing residuals. Besides, we find that the apsidal precession ephemeris model is statistically less probable than the other considered ephemeris models. It is also discussed that despite the fact that the linear ephemeris model appears to be the most plausible model to represent the transit time data, the possibility of the orbital decay cannot be completely ruled out in the TrES-3 system. To confirm this, further high-precision and high-cadence follow-up observation of transits of TrES-3b would be important.

• OSTI ID: 23013278
• Journal Information: Astronomical Journal (New York, N.Y. Online), Vol. 160, Issue 1; Other Information: Country of input: International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA); ISSN 1538-3881
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

79 ASTROPHYSICS
COSMOLOGY AND ASTRONOMY
ACCURACY
FREQUENCY ANALYSIS
MASS
PERIODICITY
PLANETS
QUALITY FACTOR
STARS