Date/Time
Date(s) - 03/09/2025
10:30 am - 11:30 am

BSB 108

Dr. Ryan Cloutier

Assistant Professor
McMaster University
Profile link: https://r-cloutier.github.io/

Title: Aligned Stellar Obliquities for Two Hot Jupiter-hosting M Dwarfs: Implications for Hot Jupiter Formation

Abstract:

Do you like Rossiters? Of course you do! Rossiters are terrific. I like them too! I will present early results from our multi-year observing campaign to measure the Rossiter-McLaughlin (RM) effect of hot Jupiters around low-mass stars known as early M dwarfs. The RM effect–seen during a planetary transit–is sensitive to the host stellar obliquity relative to the planet’s orbital plane such that the RM effect informs our understanding of a planetary system’s dynamical history, and hence its formation/migration process. I will present detections of the RM effect using the Gemini-North/MAROON-X spectrograph for two hot Jupiters around M dwarfs (HJMDs), which represent just the second and third such detections in the literature for these types of planets. I will discuss the implications of our results on the formation of HJMDs compared to around more massive stars, around which hot Jupiters are 2-3x more common and therefore may form via alternative pathways.