Loose Ends for the Exomoon Candidate Host Kepler-1625b

The claim of an exomoon candidate in the Kepler-1625b system has generated substantial discussion regarding possible alternative explanations for the purported signal. In this work, we examine these possibilities in detail. First, the effect of more flexible trend models is explored, and we show tha...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:The Astronomical journal 2020-04, Vol.159 (4), p.142
Main Authors: Teachey, Alex, Kipping, David, Burke, Christopher J., Angus, Ruth, Howard, Andrew W.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Astronomy
Centroids
Correlation coefficient
Correlation coefficients
Extrasolar moons
Extrasolar planets
Gaussian process
Random noise
Stellar rotation
Systematics
Transit
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Summary:The claim of an exomoon candidate in the Kepler-1625b system has generated substantial discussion regarding possible alternative explanations for the purported signal. In this work, we examine these possibilities in detail. First, the effect of more flexible trend models is explored, and we show that sufficiently flexible models are capable of attenuating the signal—although this is an expected byproduct of invoking such models. We also explore trend models using x- and y- centroid positions, and show that there is no data-driven impetus to adopt such models over temporal ones. We quantify the probability that the 500 ppm moon-like dip could be caused by a Neptune-sized transiting planet to be
ISSN:0004-6256
1538-3881
DOI:10.3847/1538-3881/ab7001