A. A. John, A. Collier Cameron, J. P. Faria, A. Mortier, T. G. Wilson, L. Malavolta, L. A. Buchhave, X. Dumusque, M. López-Morales, R. D. Haywood, K. Rice, A. Sozzetti, D. W. Latham, S. Udry, F. Pepe, M. Pinamonti, A. Vanderburg, A. Ghedina, R. Cosentino, M. Stalport, B. Nicholson, A. F. Martinez Fiorenzano, E. Poretti
Abstract
Minimizing the impact of stellar variability in radial velocity (RV) measurements is a critical challenge in achieving the 10 cm s−1 precision needed to hunt for Earth twins. Since 2012, a dedicated programme has been underway with HARPS-N, to conduct a blind RV rocky planets search (RPS) around bright stars in the Northern hemisphere. Here we describe the results of a comprehensive search for planetary systems in two RPS targets, HD 166620 and HD 144579. Using wavelength-domain line-profile decorrelation vectors to mitigate the stellar activity and performing a deep search for planetary reflex motions using a trans-dimensional nested sampler, we found no significant planetary signals in the data sets of either of the stars. We validated the results via data-splitting and injection recovery tests. Additionally, we obtained the 95th percentile detection limits on the HARPS-N RVs. We found that the likelihood of finding a low-mass planet increases noticeably across a wide period range when the inherent stellar variability is corrected for using SCALPELSU-vectors. We are able to detect planet signals with Msin i ≤ 1 M⊕ for orbital periods shorter than 10 d. We demonstrate that with our decorrelation technique, we are able to detect signals as low as 54 cm s−1, which brings us closer to the calibration limit of 50 cm s−1 demonstrated by HARPS-N. Therefore, we show that we can push down towards the RV precision required to find Earth analogues using high-precision radial velocity data with novel data-analysis techniques.
Keywords
line: profiles, techniques: radial velocities, planets and satellites: detection, stars: activity
Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Volume 525, Issue 2, Page 17
2023 October
