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GRK 1351:  Extrasolar Planets and their Host Stars

Subject Area Astrophysics and Astronomy
Term from 2007 to 2015
Project identifier Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 19902941
 
Final Report Year 2016

Final Report Abstract

The central goal of the RTG 1351 ”Extrasolar Planets and their Host Stars” was to provide a deeper astrophysical understanding of extrasolar planet systems and to provide a top-notch environment for the education of our PhD-students in this rather new field of astrophysical research. Since in most cases the host stars and their planets cannot be separated spatially, a thorough understanding of the host stars’ properties is an absolute essential for any success. RTG 1351 was composed of principal investigators from Hamburg Observatory and the Institute for Astrophysics at the University of Göttingen as well as the Max-Planck-Institut für Sonnensystemforschung. The participation of several institutes in RTG 1351 substantially expanded the scope of the PhD students in RTG 1351 and provided access to hardware and expertise in a way that would not have been possible otherwise. At the same time, new structures had to be developed that allowed an efficient supervision of the PhD students working in RTG 1351. Scientifically, PhD students in RTG 1351 carried out work either in theory or in observations, or in the development of new methods to study extrasolar planets or their host stars. A state-of-the-art theoretical description of the output of a stellar atmosphere is an indispensable tool for any work in extrasolar planet research. Within RTG 1351 the PhD students had access to this kind of atmospheric modelling both in one and three dimensions. As far as observations are concerned, the PhD students working in RTG 1351 had the privilege of working with the very latest data covering a large wave band range. In particular, they utilized the high precision photometric data from the CoRoT- and Kepler-Missions which allowed unprecedented studies of the longterm evolution of planet host stars in addition to high spectral resolution data from the VLT (mostly UVES- and CRIRES-data), as well as X-ray data coming from the Chandra and XMM-Newton satellites. Finally RTG 1351 focussed on the development of new tools for the study of extrasolar planets and their host stars. In this context the efforts to improve the radial velocity accuracy of high resolution spectroscopic data both in the visual and infrared wave band are important developments, as well as the development of new methods to use transiting extrasolar planets to investigate stellar properties like differential rotation or activity cycles. During the funding period of RTG 1351 50 PhD students were either funded or associated with the RTG.

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