The small transiting planet population revealed by ESPRESSO with extreme precision radial velocities

arXiv:2605.27002 · astro-ph.EP · Submitted 2026-05-26 · Read on arXiv

M. J. Hobson, B. Lavie, F. Bouchy, C. Lovis, F. Pepe, S. G. Sousa, H. M. Tabernero, S. E. van Terwisga, S. Oe, V. Adibekyan, C. Allende Prieto, Y. Alibert, S. C. C. Barros, A. Castro-González, S. Cristiani, V. D'Odorico, O. D. S. Demangeon, X. Dumusque, D. Ehrenreich, P. Figueira, R. Génova Santos, J. I. González Hernández, J. Lillo-Box, G. Lo Curto, C. J. A. P. Martins, P. Di Marcantonio, A. Mehner, G. Micela, P. Molaro, N. J. Nunes, E. Palle, R. Rebolo, J. Rodrigues, N. Santos, A. Sozzetti, S. Udry, A. Suárez Mascareño, M. -R. Zapatero Osorio

Observatoire de Genève, Switzerland · Observatoire de Genève, Switzerland · Observatoire de Genève, Switzerland · Observatoire de Genève, Switzerland · Observatoire de Genève, Switzerland · Departamento de Física e Astronomia, Faculdade de Ciências, Universidade do Porto, Portugal · Institut de Ciències de l'Espai · Space Research Institute, Austrian Academy of Sciences, Austria · Institute of Astronomy, KU Leuven, Belgium · Departamento de Física e Astronomia, Faculdade de Ciências, Universidade do Porto, Portugal · Departamento de Astrofísica, Universidad de La Laguna, Spain · Center for Space and Habitability, University of Bern, Switzerland · Departamento de Física e Astronomia, Faculdade de Ciências, Universidade do Porto, Portugal · Observatoire de Genève, Switzerland · IFPU-Institute for Fundamental Physics of the Universe, Italy · INAF- Osservatorio Astronomico di Trieste, Italy · Instituto de Astrofísica e Ciências do Espaço, Portugal · Observatoire de Genève, Switzerland · Observatoire de Genève, Switzerland · Instituto de Astrofísica de Andalucía-CSIC, Spain · Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias, Spain · Departamento de Astrofísica, Universidad de La Laguna, Spain · Centro de Astrobiología, CSIC-INTA, Spain · European Southern Observatory, Chile · Instituto de Astrofísica e Ciências do Espaço, Portugal · INAF- Osservatorio Astronomico di Trieste, Italy · European Southern Observatory, Chile · INAF - Osservatorio Astronomico di Palermo, Italy · INAF- Osservatorio Astronomico di Trieste, Italy · Instituto de Astrofísica e Ciências do Espaço, Faculdade de Ciências da Universidade de Lisboa, Portugal · Departamento de Astrofísica, Universidad de La Laguna, Spain · Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, Spain · Observatoire de Genève, Switzerland · Departamento de Física e Astronomia, Faculdade de Ciências, Universidade do Porto, Portugal · INAF - Osservatorio Astrofisico di Torino, Italy · Observatoire de Genève, Switzerland · Departamento de Astrofísica, Universidad de La Laguna, Spain · Centro de Astrobiología, CSIC-INTA, Spain

astro-ph.EP

Submitted: 2026-05-26

Comments: 18 pages main text, 8 pages appendices. Accepted for publication in A&A

Code: https://github.com/hmtabernero/SteParSyn

Project page: https://lightkurve.github.io/lightkurve/index.html

License: http://arxiv.org/licenses/nonexclusive-distrib/1.0/

Terminology

• Metallicity — 23× in this paper · explained in 3 episodes
• Core — 15× in this paper · explained in 2 episodes
• Calibration — 3× in this paper · explained in 7 episodes
• Swiss National Science Foundation — 3× in this paper
• Active Regions — 2× in this paper · explained in 1 episode
• Adam — 2× in this paper · explained in 2 episodes
• Society of PhotoOptical Instrumentation Engineers — 2× in this paper
• Transmission spectroscopy — 2× in this paper · explained in 2 episodes
• Aperture — 1× in this paper · explained in 1 episode
• Consistency — 1× in this paper · explained in 3 episodes
• Gaussian Processes (GPs) — 1× in this paper · explained in 2 episodes
• Mikulski Archive for Space Telescopes — 1× in this paper
• Very Large Telescope — 1× in this paper

Sources

• A radius valley between migrated steam worlds and evaporated rocky cores
• The New Generation Planetary Population Synthesis (NGPPS) VIII. Impact of host star metallicity on planet occurrence rates, orbital periods, eccentricities, and radius valley morphology
• Gaia Data Release 3: Summary of the content and survey properties
• The HARPS search for southern extra-solar planets XXXIV. Occurrence, mass distribution and orbital properties of super-Earths and Neptune-mass planets
• TESS and ESPRESSO discover a super-Earth and a mini-Neptune orbiting the K-dwarf TOI-238
• A fading radius valley towards M-dwarfs, a persistent density valley across stellar types

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