When
3:45 p.m., Nov. 19, 2013
Where
Kuiper Space Sciences 312
Dr. Ian Crossfield
Postdoctoral Fellow
Max Planck Institute for Astronomy
A Clearer View of Cloudy Brown Dwarfs and Exoplanets
Abstract:
Clouds and hazes are ubiquitous in substellar atmospheres, sculpting the emission spectra of planets, exoplanets, and brown dwarfs. Though clouds have long been inferred to exist in brown dwarfs and were assumed to also exist in exoplanets, the atmospheric chemistry and dynamics involved remain imperfectly understood. I will discuss recent efforts that have begun to shed light on these phenomena in exoplanets and brown dwarfs via measurements of globally-integrated thermal emission, longitudinally-averaged 1D thermal phase curves, and global 2Dmaps. In particular, I will highlight our recent results that demonstrate the exciting new capability to obtain global 2D "weather movies" of the formation, evolution, and breakup of global cloud patterns in brown dwarfs. Such observations will eventually place transformative constraints on the atmospheric structure, circulation, and cloud chemistry of substellar objects beyond the Solar system.
Host: Travis Barman
Postdoctoral Fellow
Max Planck Institute for Astronomy
A Clearer View of Cloudy Brown Dwarfs and Exoplanets
Abstract:
Clouds and hazes are ubiquitous in substellar atmospheres, sculpting the emission spectra of planets, exoplanets, and brown dwarfs. Though clouds have long been inferred to exist in brown dwarfs and were assumed to also exist in exoplanets, the atmospheric chemistry and dynamics involved remain imperfectly understood. I will discuss recent efforts that have begun to shed light on these phenomena in exoplanets and brown dwarfs via measurements of globally-integrated thermal emission, longitudinally-averaged 1D thermal phase curves, and global 2Dmaps. In particular, I will highlight our recent results that demonstrate the exciting new capability to obtain global 2D "weather movies" of the formation, evolution, and breakup of global cloud patterns in brown dwarfs. Such observations will eventually place transformative constraints on the atmospheric structure, circulation, and cloud chemistry of substellar objects beyond the Solar system.
Host: Travis Barman
General
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