TESS light curve of beta Pictoris

DOI

We search for signs of falling evaporating bodies (FEBs, also known as exocomets) in photometric time series obtained for {beta} Pictoris after fitting and removing its {delta} Scuti-type pulsation frequencies. Using photometric data obtained by the TESS satellite we determined the pulsational properties of the exoplanet host star {beta} Pictoris through frequency analysis. We then pre-whitened the 54 identified {delta} Scuti p-modes and investigated the residual photometric time series for the presence of FEBs. We identify three distinct dipping events in the light curve of {beta} Pictoris over a 105-day period. These dips have depths from 0.5 to 2-millimagnitudes and durations of up to 2-days for the largest dip. These dips are asymmetric in nature and are consistent with a model of an evaporating comet with an extended tail crossing the disc of the star. We present the first broadband detections of exocomets crossing the disc of {beta} Pictoris, complementing the predictions made 20 years earlier by Lecavelier Des Etangs et al. (1999A&A...343..916L). No periodic transits are seen in this time series. These observations confirm the spectroscopic detection of exocomets in calcium H and K lines that have been seen in high resolution spectroscopy.

Identifier
DOI http://doi.org/10.26093/cds/vizier.36259013
Source https://dc.g-vo.org/rr/q/lp/custom/CDS.VizieR/J/A+A/625/L13
Related Identifier https://cdsarc.cds.unistra.fr/viz-bin/cat/J/A+A/625/L13
Related Identifier http://vizier.cds.unistra.fr/viz-bin/VizieR-2?-source=J/A+A/625/L13
Metadata Access http://dc.g-vo.org/rr/q/pmh/pubreg.xml?verb=GetRecord&metadataPrefix=oai_b2find&identifier=ivo://CDS.VizieR/J/A+A/625/L13
Provenance
Creator Zieba S.; Zwintz K.; Kenworthy M.; Kennedy G.M.
Publisher CDS
Publication Year 2019
Rights https://cds.unistra.fr/vizier-org/licences_vizier.html
OpenAccess true
Contact CDS support team <cds-question(at)unistra.fr>
Representation
Resource Type Dataset; AstroObjects
Discipline Astrophysics and Astronomy; Natural Sciences; Observational Astronomy; Physics; Solar System Astronomy