Large Interferometer For Exoplanets (LIFE): XIV. Finding terrestrial protoplanets in the galactic neighborhood

Lorenzo Cesario*, Tim Lichtenberg*, Eleonora Alei, Óscar Carrión-González, Felix A. Dannert, Denis Defrère, Steve Ertel, Andrea Fortier, A. García Muñoz, Adrian M. Glauser, Jonah T. Hansen, Ravit Helled, Philipp A. Huber, Michael J. Ireland, Jens Kammerer, Romain Laugier, Jorge Lillo-Box, Franziska Menti, Michael R. Meyer, Lena NoackSascha P. Quanz, Andreas Quirrenbach, Sarah Rugheimer, Floris van der Tak, Haiyang S. Wang, Marius Anger, Olga Balsalobre-Ruza, Surendra Bhattarai, Marrick Braam, Amadeo Castro-González, Charles S. Cockell, Tereza Constantinou, Gabriele Cugno, Jeanne Davoult, Manuel Güdel, Nina Hernitschek, Sasha Hinkley, Satoshi Itoh, Markus Janson, Anders Johansen, Hugh R. A. Jones, Stephen R. Kane, Tim A. van Kempen, Kristina G. Kislyakova, Judith Korth, Andjelka B. Kovačević, Stefan Kraus, Rolf Kuiper, Joice Mathew, Taro Matsuo, Yamila Miguel, Michiel Min, Ramon Navarro, Ramses M. Ramirez, Heike Rauer, Berke Vow Ricketti, Amedeo Romagnolo, Martin Schlecker, Evan L. Sneed, Vito Squicciarini, Keivan G. Stassun, Motohide Tamura, Daniel Viudez-Moreiras, Robin D. Wordsworth

*Corresponding author af dette arbejde

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Abstract

Context. The increased brightness temperature of young rocky protoplanets during their magma ocean epoch makes them potentially amenable to atmospheric characterization at distances from the Solar System far greater than thermally equilibrated terrestrial exoplanets, offering observational opportunities for unique insights into the origin of secondary atmospheres and the near surface conditions of prebiotic environments. Aims. The Large Interferometer For Exoplanets (LIFE) mission will employ a space-based midinfrared nulling interferometer to directly measure the thermal emission of terrestrial exoplanets. In this work, we seek to assess the capabilities of various instrumental design choices of the LIFE mission concept for the detection of cooling protoplanets with transient high-temperature magma ocean atmospheres at the tail end of planetary accretion. In particular, we investigate the minimum integration times necessary to detect transient magma ocean exoplanets in young stellar associations in the Solar neighborhood. Methods. Using the LIFE mission instrument simulator (LIFEsim), we assessed how specific instrumental parameters and design choices, such as wavelength coverage, aperture diameter, and photon throughput, facilitate or disadvantage the detection of protoplan-ets. We focused on the observational sensitivities of distance to the observed planetary system, protoplanet brightness temperature (using a blackbody assumption), and orbital distance of the potential protoplanets around both G- and M-dwarf stars. Results. Our simulations suggest that LIFE will be able to detect (S/N ≥ 7) hot protoplanets in young stellar associations up to distances of 100 pc from the Solar System for reasonable integration times (up to a few hours). Detection of an Earth-sized protoplanet orbiting a Solar-sized host star at 1 AU requires less than 30 minutes of integration time. M-dwarfs generally need shorter integration times. The contribution from wavelength regions smaller than 6 μm is important for decreasing the detection threshold and discriminating emission temperatures. Conclusions. The LIFE mission is capable of detecting cooling terrestrial protoplanets within minutes to hours in several local young stellar associations hosting potential targets. The anticipated compositional range of magma ocean atmospheres motivates further architectural design studies to characterize the crucial transition from primary to secondary atmospheres.

OriginalsprogEngelsk
ArtikelnummerA172
TidsskriftAstronomy and Astrophysics
Vol/bind692
Antal sider18
ISSN0004-6361
DOI
StatusUdgivet - 2024

Bibliografisk note

Funding Information:
The authors thank the anonymous reviewer and Daniel Angerhausen and Alycia Weinberger for comments and discussions that improved the paper. T.L. acknowledges support from the Branco Weiss Foundation and the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation (AEThER project, G202114194). Parts of this work have been carried out within the framework of the National Centre of Competence in Research PlanetS supported by the Swiss National Science Foundation under grants 51NF40_182901 and 51NF40_205606. The results reported herein benefited from collaborations and/or information exchange within NASA's Nexus for Exoplanet System Science (NExSS) research coordination network sponsored by NASA's Science Mission Directorate under Agreement No. 80NSSC21K0593 for the program \"Alien Earths\". S.P.Q. acknowledges the financial support of the SNSF. A.Fo. acknowledges support from the Swiss Space Office through the ESA PRODEX program. A.J. thanks the Danish National Research Foundation (DNRF Chair Grant DNRF159) and the Carlsberg Foundation (Semper Ardens: Advance grant FIRSTATMO). D.D. acknowledges the support from the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation program (grant agreement CoG - 866070). V.S. acknowledges the support of the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation program (COBREX; grant agreement no. 885593). C.C. acknowledges support from the Science and Technology Facilities Council (Grant ST/Y001788/1). J.L.-B. is funded by the Spanish MICIU/AEI/10.13039/501100011033 and NextGenerationEU/PRTR grants PID2019-107061GB-C61 and CNS2023- 144309. A.C.-G. is funded by the Spanish Ministry of Science through MCIN/AEI/10.13039/501100011033 grant PID2019-107061GB-C61. J.K. gratefully acknowledges the support of the Swedish Research Council (VR: Etableringsbidrag 2017-04945) O.B.-R. is supported by INTA grant PRE-MDM-07, Spanish MCIN/AEI/10.13039/501100011033 grant PID2019-107061GB-C6, and CNS2023-144309. R.K. acknowledges financial support via the Heisenberg Research Grant funded by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation) under grant no. KU 2849/9, project no. 445783058. This work has received funding from the Research Foundation - Flanders (FWO) under the grant number 1234224N. G.C. thanks the Swiss National Science Foundation for financial support under grant number P500PT_206785 RR edited the paper and provided feedback and analysis of results. M.T. is supported by JSPS KAKENHI grant No.18H05442. M.B. acknowledges funding from the European Union H2020-MSCA-ITN-2019 under grant agreement no. 860470 (CHAMELEON). S.K. acknowledges support by the European Research Council (ERC Consolidator grant, No. 101003096). A.B.K. is supported by the Ministry of Science, Technological Development, and Innovation of R. Serbia through projects of the University of Belgrade - Faculty of Mathematics (contract 451-03-68/2023-14/200104).

Funding Information:
The authors thank the anonymous reviewer and Daniel Angerhausen and Alycia Weinberger for comments and discussions that improved the paper. T.L. acknowledges support from the Branco Weiss Foundation and the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation (AEThER project, G202114194). Parts of this work have been carried out within the framework of the National Centre of Competence in Research PlanetS supported by the Swiss National Science Foundation under grants 51NF40_182901 and 51NF40_205606. The results reported herein benefited from collaborations and/or information exchange within NASA\u2019s Nexus for Exoplanet System Science (NExSS) research coordination network sponsored by NASA\u2019s Science Mission Directorate under Agreement No. 80NSSC21K0593 for the program \u201CAlien Earths\u201D. S.P.Q. acknowledges the financial support of the SNSF. A.Fo. acknowledges support from the Swiss Space Office through the ESA PRODEX program. A.J. thanks the Danish National Research Foundation (DNRF Chair Grant DNRF159) and the Carlsberg Foundation (Semper Ardens: Advance grant FIRSTATMO). D.D. acknowledges the support from the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union\u2019s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program (grant agreement CoG - 866070). V.S. acknowledges the support of the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union\u2019s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program (COBREX; grant agreement no. 885593). C.C. acknowledges support from the Science and Technology Facilities Council (Grant ST/Y001788/1). J.L.-B. is funded by the Spanish MICIU/AEI/10.13039/501100011033 and NextGenerationEU/PRTR grants PID2019-107061GB-C61 and CNS2023-144309. A.C.-G. is funded by the Spanish Ministry of Science through MCIN/AEI/10.13039/501100011033 grant PID2019-107061GB-C61. J.K. gratefully acknowledges the support of the Swedish Research Council (VR: Etab-leringsbidrag 2017-04945) O.B.-R. is supported by INTA grant PRE-MDM-07, Spanish MCIN/AEI/10.13039/501100011033 grant PID2019-107061GB-C6, and CNS2023-144309. R.K. acknowledges financial support via the Heisenberg Research Grant funded by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation) under grant no.KU 2849/9, project no. 445783058. This work has received funding from the Research Foundation - Flanders (FWO) under the grant number 1234224N. G.C. thanks the Swiss National Science Foundation for financial support under grant number P500PT_206785 RR edited the paper and provided feedback and analysis of results. M.T. is supported by JSPS KAKENHI grant No.18H05442. M.B. acknowledges funding from the European Union H2020-MSCA-ITN-2019 under grant agreement no. 860470 (CHAMELEON). S.K. acknowledges support by the European Research Council (ERC Consolidator grant, No. 101003096). A.B.K. is supported by the Ministry of Science, Technological Development, and Innovation of R. Serbia through projects of the University of Belgrade - Faculty of Mathematics (contract 451-03-68/2023-14/200104).

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