S21B0111
S21B0111
With an effective temperature of almost 3300 K, WASP-33b is one of the hottest planet’s known to date. This high day-side temperature is comparable to that of an M5V star, and atomic lines from Fe have been detected in the planet’s optical emission spectrum, which also enabled some constraints on the day-night phase-curve of the planet. Recently, we have made the first detection of OH in the near-infrared spectrum of this planet using Subaru IRD, but unfortunately, bad weather and telescope problems prevented us from detecting any other molecular species at any significance. Therefore, we request 2 nights of observing time with IRD to complete these observations and 1) confirm our tentative H2O detection, 2) further improve our OH detection and constrain the temperature-pressure profile of the atmosphere, 3) measure the day-night variations, including the hot-spot offset, in the near-infrared, and 4) search for other species with weaker features (e.g. TiO, CH4, CO). We will combine the signal from a large number of lines, thereby increasing the SNR, and enabling a robust detection of the targeted molecules, provide a direct determination of the planet’s orbital velocity and allow a direct measurement of the mass of both the star and planet.
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