Imperial College London

DrJamesOwen

Faculty of Natural SciencesDepartment of Physics

Senior Lecturer in Exoplanet Physics
 
 
 
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Contact

 

+44 (0)20 7594 5785james.owen CV

 
 
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Location

 

Blackett LaboratorySouth Kensington Campus

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Summary

 

Publications

Citation

BibTex format

@article{Rogers:2023:2041-8213/acc86f,
author = {Rogers, JGG and Schlichting, HEE and Owen, JEE},
doi = {2041-8213/acc86f},
journal = {Letters of the Astrophysical Journal},
title = {Conclusive evidence for a population of water worlds around M dwarfs remains elusive},
url = {http://dx.doi.org/10.3847/2041-8213/acc86f},
volume = {947},
year = {2023}
}

RIS format (EndNote, RefMan)

TY  - JOUR
AB - The population of small, close-in exoplanets is bifurcated into super-Earths and sub-Neptunes. We calculate physically motivated mass–radius relations for sub-Neptunes, with rocky cores and H/He-dominated atmospheres, accounting for their thermal evolution, irradiation, and mass loss. For planets 10 M⊕, we find that sub-Neptunes retain atmospheric mass fractions that scale with planet mass and show that the resulting mass–radius relations are degenerate with results for "water worlds" consisting of a 1:1 silicate-to-ice composition ratio. We further demonstrate that our derived mass–radius relation is in excellent agreement with the observed exoplanet population orbiting M dwarfs and that planet mass and radii alone are insufficient to determine the composition of some sub-Neptunes. Finally, we highlight that current exoplanet demographics show an increase in the ratio of super-Earths to sub-Neptunes with both stellar mass (and therefore luminosity) and age, which are both indicative of thermally driven atmospheric escape processes. Therefore, such processes should not be ignored when making compositional inferences in the mass–radius diagram.
AU - Rogers,JGG
AU - Schlichting,HEE
AU - Owen,JEE
DO - 2041-8213/acc86f
PY - 2023///
SN - 2041-8205
TI - Conclusive evidence for a population of water worlds around M dwarfs remains elusive
T2 - Letters of the Astrophysical Journal
UR - http://dx.doi.org/10.3847/2041-8213/acc86f
UR - https://www.webofscience.com/api/gateway?GWVersion=2&SrcApp=PARTNER_APP&SrcAuth=LinksAMR&KeyUT=WOS:000974195900001&DestLinkType=FullRecord&DestApp=ALL_WOS&UsrCustomerID=a2bf6146997ec60c407a63945d4e92bb
UR - https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/2041-8213/acc86f
UR - http://hdl.handle.net/10044/1/107041
VL - 947
ER -