articleThe Astrophysical Journal LettersJul 12, 2010BRONZE OA

HOT STARS WITH HOT JUPITERS HAVE HIGH OBLIQUITIES

Massachusetts Institute of Technology · Center for Astrophysics Harvard & Smithsonian · +2 more institutions

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Abstract

We show that stars with transiting planets for which the stellar obliquity is large are preferentially hot (T_(eff) > 6250 K). This could explain why small obliquities were observed in the earliest measurements, which focused on relatively cool stars drawn from Doppler surveys, as opposed to hotter stars that emerged more recently from transit surveys. The observed trend could be due to differences in planet formation and migration around stars of varying mass. Alternatively, we speculate that hot-Jupiter systems begin with a wide range of obliquities, but the photospheres of cool stars realign with the orbits due to tidal dissipation in their convective zones, while hot stars cannot realign because of…

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