Trigonometric Parallaxes for 1,507 Nearby Mid-to-Late M-dwarfs

The MEarth survey is a search for small rocky planets around the smallest, nearest stars to the Sun as identified by high proper motion with red colors. We augmented our planetary search time series with lower cadence astrometric imaging and obtained two million images of approximately 1800 stars suspected to be mid-to-late M dwarfs. We fit an astrometric model to MEarth's images for 1507 stars and obtained trigonometric distance measurements to each star with an average precision of 5 milliarcseconds. Our measurements, combined with the 2MASS photometry, allowed us to obtain an absolute K_s magnitude for each star. In turn, this allows us to better estimate the stellar parameters than those obtained with photometric estimates alone and to better prioritize the targets chosen to monitor at high cadence for planetary transits. The MEarth sample is mostly complete out to a distance of 25 parsecs for stars of type M5.5V and earlier, and mostly complete for later type stars out to 20 parsecs. We find eight stars that are within ten parsecs of the Sun for which there did not exist a published trigonometric parallax distance estimate. We release with this work a catalog of the trigonometric parallax measurements for 1,507 mid-to-late M-dwarfs, as well as new estimates of their masses and radii.Comment: ApJ, accepted. 36 pages, 8 figures, 2 tables. Please find our data table here: http://www.cfa.harvard.edu/MEarth/DataDR2.htm

The rotation and Galactic kinematics of mid M dwarfs in the Solar Neighborhood

Rotation is a directly-observable stellar property, and drives magnetic field generation and activity through a magnetic dynamo. Main sequence stars with masses below approximately 0.35Msun (mid-to-late M dwarfs) are fully-convective, and are expected to have a different type of dynamo mechanism than solar-type stars. Measurements of their rotation rates provide insights into these mechanisms, but few rotation periods are available for these stars at field ages. Using photometry from the MEarth transit survey, we measure rotation periods for 387 nearby, mid-to-late M dwarfs in the Northern hemisphere, finding periods from 0.1 to 140 days. The typical detected rotator has stable, sinusoidal photometric modulations at a semi-amplitude of 0.5 to 1%. We find no period-amplitude relation for stars below 0.25Msun and an anti-correlation between period and amplitude for higher-mass M dwarfs. We highlight the existence of older, slowly-rotating stars without H{\alpha} emission that nevertheless have strong photometric variability. The Galactic kinematics of our sample is consistent with the local population of G and K dwarfs, and rotators have metallicities characteristic of the Solar Neighborhood. We use the W space velocities and established age-velocity relations to estimate that stars with P<10 days are on average <2 Gyrs, and that those with P>70 days are about 5 Gyrs. The period distribution is mass dependent: as the mass decreases, the slowest rotators at a given mass have longer periods, and the fastest rotators have shorter periods. We find a lack of stars with intermediate rotation periods. [Abridged]Comment: Accepted to ApJ. Machine readable tables and additional figures are available in the published article or on reques

A Tentative Detection of a Starspot During Consecutive Transits of an Extrasolar Planet from the Ground: No Evidence of a Double Transiting Planet System Around TrES-1

There have been numerous reports of anomalies during transits of the planet TrES-1b. Recently, Rabus and coworkers' analysis of HST observations lead them to claim brightening anomalies during transit might be caused by either a second transiting planet or a cool starspot. Observations of two consecutive transits are presented here from the University of Arizona's 61-inch Kuiper Telescope on May 12 and May 15, 2008 UT. A 5.4 +/- 1.7 mmag (0.54 +/- 0.17%) brightening anomaly was detected during the first half of the transit on May 12 and again in the second half of the transit on May 15th. We conclude that this is a tentative detection of a r greater than or equal to 6 earth radii starspot rotating on the surface of the star. We suggest that all evidence to date suggest TrES-1 has a spotty surface and there is no need to introduce a second transiting planet in this system to explain these anomalies. We are only able to constrain the rotational period of the star to 40.2 +22.9 -14.6 days, due to previous errors in measuring the alignment of the stellar spin axis with the planetary orbital axis. This is consistent with the previously observed P_obs = 33.2 +22.3 -14.3 day period. We note that this technique could be applied to other transiting systems for which starspots exist on the star in the transit path of the planet in order to constrain the rotation rate of the star. (abridged)Comment: 21 pages, 3 tables, 6 figures, Accepted to Ap

On the Apparent Orbital Inclination Change of the Extrasolar Transiting Planet TrES-2b

On June 15, 2009 UT the transit of TrES-2b was detected using the University of Arizona's 1.55 meter Kuiper Telescope with 2.0-2.5 millimag RMS accuracy in the I-band. We find a central transit time of $T_c = 2454997.76286 \pm0.00035$ HJD, an orbital period of $P = 2.4706127 \pm 0.0000009$ days, and an inclination angle of $i = 83^{\circ}.92 \pm 0.05$, which is consistent with our re-fit of the original I-band light curve of O'Donovan et al. (2006) where we find $i = 83^{\circ}.84 \pm0.05$. We calculate an insignificant inclination change of $\Delta i = -0^{\circ}.08 \pm 0.07$ over the last 3 years, and as such, our observations rule out, at the $\sim 11 \sigma$ level, the apparent change of orbital inclination to $i_{predicted} = 83^{\circ}.35 \pm0.1$ as predicted by Mislis and Schmitt (2009) and Mislis et al. (2010) for our epoch. Moreover, our analysis of a recently published Kepler Space Telescope light curve (Gilliland et al. 2010) for TrES-2b finds an inclination of $i = 83^{\circ}.91 \pm0.03$ for a similar epoch. These Kepler results definitively rule out change in $i$ as a function of time. Indeed, we detect no significant changes in any of the orbital parameters of TrES-2b.Comment: 19 pages, 1 table, 7 figures. Re-submitted to ApJ, January 14, 201

A Search for Additional Bodies in the GJ 1132 Planetary System from 21 Ground-based Transits and a 100 Hour Spitzer Campaign

We present the results of a search for additional bodies in the GJ 1132 system through two methods: photometric transits and transit timing variations of the known planet. We collected 21 transit observations of GJ 1132b with the MEarth-South array since 2015. We obtained 100 near-continuous hours of observations with the $Spitzer$ Space Telescope, including two transits of GJ 1132b and spanning 60\% of the orbital phase of the maximum period at which bodies coplanar with GJ 1132b would pass in front of the star. We exclude transits of additional Mars-sized bodies, such as a second planet or a moon, with a confidence of 99.7\%. When we combine the mass estimate of the star (obtained from its parallax and apparent $K_s$ band magnitude) with the stellar density inferred from our high-cadence $Spitzer$ light curve (assuming zero eccentricity), we measure the stellar radius of GJ 1132 to be $0.2105^{+0.0102}_{-0.0085} R_\odot$, and we refine the radius measurement of GJ 1132b to $1.130 \pm 0.056 R_\oplus$. Combined with HARPS RV measurements, we determine the density of GJ 1132b to be $6.2 \pm 2.0$\ g cm$^{-3}$, with the mass determination dominating this uncertainty. We refine the ephemeris of the system and find no evidence for transit timing variations, which would be expected if there was a second planet near an orbital resonance with GJ 1132b.Comment: 29 pages, 4 Tables, 8 Figures, Submitted to ApJ. Comments welcom

A Revised Orbital Ephemeris for HAT-P-9b

We present here three transit observations of HAT-P-9b taken on 14 February 2010, 18 February 2010, and 05 April 2010 UT from the University of Arizona's 1.55 meter Kuiper telescope on Mt. Bigelow. Our transit light curves were obtained in the I filter for all our observations, and underwent the same reduction process. All three of our transits deviated significantly (approximately 24 minutes earlier) from the ephemeris of Shporer et al. (2008). However, due to the large time span between our observed transits and those of Shporer et al. (2008), a 6.5 second (2 sigma) shift downwards in orbital period from the value of Shporer et al. (2008) is sufficient to explain all available transit data. We find a new period of 3.922814 +/- 0.000002 days for HAT-P-9b with no evidence for significant nonlinearities in the transit period.Comment: 10 pages, 3 figure

A Mid-life crisis? Sudden Changes in Radio and X-Ray Emission from Supernova 1970G

Supernovae provide a backdrop from which we can probe the end state of stellar evolution in the final years before the progenitor star explodes. As the shock from the supernova expands, the timespan of mass loss history we are able to probe also extends, providing insight to rapid time-scale processes that govern the end state of massive stars. While supernovae transition into remnants on timescales of decades to centuries, observations of this phase are currently limited. Here we present observations of SN 1970G, serendipitously observed during the monitoring campaign of SN 2011fe that shares the same host galaxy. Utilizing the new Jansky Very Large Array upgrade and a deep X-ray exposure taken by the Chandra Space Telescope, we are able to recover this middle-aged supernova and distinctly resolve it from the HII cloud with which it is associated. We find that the flux density of SN 1970G has changed significantly since it was last observed - the X-ray luminosity has increased by a factor of ~3, while we observe a significantly lower radio flux of only 27.5 micro-Jy at 6.75 GHz, a level only detectable through the upgrades now in operation at the Jansky Very Large Array. These changes suggest that SN 1970G has entered a new stage of evolution towards a supernova remnant, and we may be detecting the turn-on of the pulsar wind nebula. Deep radio observations of additional middle-aged supernovae with the improved radio facilities will provide a statistical census of the delicate transition period between supernova and remnant.Comment: ApJ, accepted. Minor fixes implemented. 17 Pages, 2 Tables, 4 Figure