Flux and Polarization Signals of Water Clouds on Earth-Like Exoplanets

Authors
Publication date 2010
Host editors
  • V. Coudé du Foresto
  • D.M. Gelino
  • I. Ribas
Book title Pathways Towards Habitable Planets
Book subtitle proceedings of a workshop held by the Spanish CSIC, the Catalan IEEC, the NASA Exoplanet Science Institute, and the Blue Dots Initiative at CosmoCaixa, the Barcelona Museum of Science in Barcelona, Spain, 14-18 September 2009
ISBN
  • 9781583817407
ISBN (electronic)
  • 9781583817414
Series Astronomical Society of the Pacific conference series
Event conference "Pathways towards habitable planets"
Pages (from-to) 466-468
Publisher San Francisco, CA: Astronomical Society of the Pacific
Organisations
  • Faculty of Science (FNWI) - Anton Pannekoek Institute for Astronomy (API)
Abstract We present numerically simulated flux and polarisation signals of starlight that is reflected by Earth–like exoplanets covered by liquid water clouds at different altitudes, at wavelengths from 0.3 to 1.0μm. Our results show that the degree of polarisation of this reflected light is more sensitive to the cloud top pressure than the flux. The results clearly illustrate the advantages of polarimetry for the characterisation of clouds in exoplanet atmospheres.
Document type Conference contribution
Language English
Published at http://aspbooks.org/custom/publications/paper/430-0466.html
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