Comparing Apples with Apples: Robust Detection Limits for Exoplanet High-contrast Imaging in the Presence of Non-Gaussian Noise
Over the past decade, hundreds of nights have been spent on the world’s largest telescopes to search for and directly detect new exoplanets using high-contrast imaging (HCI). Thereby, two scientific goals are of central interest: first, to study the characteristics of the underlying planet populatio...
| Main Authors: | , , , , , , , , , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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IOP Publishing
2023-01-01
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| Series: | The Astronomical Journal |
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| Online Access: | https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-3881/acc93c |
| _version_ | 1797698870007824384 |
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| author | Markus J. Bonse Emily O. Garvin Timothy D. Gebhard Felix A. Dannert Faustine Cantalloube Gabriele Cugno Olivier Absil Jean Hayoz Julien Milli Markus Kasper Sascha P. Quanz |
| author_facet | Markus J. Bonse Emily O. Garvin Timothy D. Gebhard Felix A. Dannert Faustine Cantalloube Gabriele Cugno Olivier Absil Jean Hayoz Julien Milli Markus Kasper Sascha P. Quanz |
| author_sort | Markus J. Bonse |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Over the past decade, hundreds of nights have been spent on the world’s largest telescopes to search for and directly detect new exoplanets using high-contrast imaging (HCI). Thereby, two scientific goals are of central interest: first, to study the characteristics of the underlying planet population and distinguish between different planet formation and evolution theories. Second, to find and characterize planets in our immediate solar neighborhood. Both goals heavily rely on the metric used to quantify planet detections and nondetections. Current standards often rely on several explicit or implicit assumptions about noise. For example, it is often assumed that the residual noise after data postprocessing is Gaussian. While being an inseparable part of the metric, these assumptions are rarely verified. This is problematic as any violation of these assumptions can lead to systematic biases. This makes it hard, if not impossible, to compare results across data sets or instruments with different noise characteristics. We revisit the fundamental question of how to quantify detection limits in HCI. We focus our analysis on the error budget resulting from violated assumptions. To this end, we propose a new metric based on bootstrapping that generalizes current standards to non-Gaussian noise. We apply our method to archival HCI data from the NACO instrument at the Very Large Telescope and derive detection limits for different types of noise. Our analysis shows that current standards tend to give detection limits that are about one magnitude too optimistic in the speckle-dominated regime. That is, HCI surveys may have excluded planets that can still exist. |
| first_indexed | 2024-03-12T04:00:15Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-01c84df56d0c405fa128f4840a192954 |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 1538-3881 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-03-12T04:00:15Z |
| publishDate | 2023-01-01 |
| publisher | IOP Publishing |
| record_format | Article |
| series | The Astronomical Journal |
| spelling | doaj.art-01c84df56d0c405fa128f4840a1929542023-09-03T11:34:34ZengIOP PublishingThe Astronomical Journal1538-38812023-01-0116627110.3847/1538-3881/acc93cComparing Apples with Apples: Robust Detection Limits for Exoplanet High-contrast Imaging in the Presence of Non-Gaussian NoiseMarkus J. Bonse0https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2202-1745Emily O. Garvin1https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2530-9330Timothy D. Gebhard2https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9310-8579Felix A. Dannert3https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5476-2663Faustine Cantalloube4https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3968-3780Gabriele Cugno5https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7255-3251Olivier Absil6https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4006-6237Jean Hayoz7https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3768-5712Julien Milli8https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9325-2511Markus Kasper9https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8425-6606Sascha P. Quanz10https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3829-7412ETH Zurich, Institute for Particle Physics & Astrophysics , Wolfgang-Pauli-Str. 27, 8093 Zurich, Switzerland ; mbonse@phys.ethz.ch; Max Planck Institute for Intelligent Systems , Max-Planck-Ring 4, D-72076 Tübingen, GermanyETH Zurich, Institute for Particle Physics & Astrophysics , Wolfgang-Pauli-Str. 27, 8093 Zurich, Switzerland ; mbonse@phys.ethz.chETH Zurich, Institute for Particle Physics & Astrophysics , Wolfgang-Pauli-Str. 27, 8093 Zurich, Switzerland ; mbonse@phys.ethz.ch; Max Planck Institute for Intelligent Systems , Max-Planck-Ring 4, D-72076 Tübingen, Germany; Max Planck ETH Center for Learning Systems , Max-Planck-Ring 4, D-72076 Tübingen, GermanyETH Zurich, Institute for Particle Physics & Astrophysics , Wolfgang-Pauli-Str. 27, 8093 Zurich, Switzerland ; mbonse@phys.ethz.ch; National Center of Competence in Research Planets ,10 SwitzerlandAix Marseille University , CNRS, CNES, LAM, Marseille, FranceETH Zurich, Institute for Particle Physics & Astrophysics , Wolfgang-Pauli-Str. 27, 8093 Zurich, Switzerland ; mbonse@phys.ethz.ch; University of Michigan , Department of Astronomy, Ann Arbor, MI 48109, USAUniversité de Liège, STAR Institute , Allée du Six Août 19c, B-4000 Liège, BelgiumETH Zurich, Institute for Particle Physics & Astrophysics , Wolfgang-Pauli-Str. 27, 8093 Zurich, Switzerland ; mbonse@phys.ethz.ch; National Center of Competence in Research Planets ,10 SwitzerlandUniversité Grenoble Alpes , CNRS, IPAG, F-38000 Grenoble, FranceEuropean Southern Observatory , Garching bei München, GermanyETH Zurich, Institute for Particle Physics & Astrophysics , Wolfgang-Pauli-Str. 27, 8093 Zurich, Switzerland ; mbonse@phys.ethz.ch; National Center of Competence in Research Planets ,10 SwitzerlandOver the past decade, hundreds of nights have been spent on the world’s largest telescopes to search for and directly detect new exoplanets using high-contrast imaging (HCI). Thereby, two scientific goals are of central interest: first, to study the characteristics of the underlying planet population and distinguish between different planet formation and evolution theories. Second, to find and characterize planets in our immediate solar neighborhood. Both goals heavily rely on the metric used to quantify planet detections and nondetections. Current standards often rely on several explicit or implicit assumptions about noise. For example, it is often assumed that the residual noise after data postprocessing is Gaussian. While being an inseparable part of the metric, these assumptions are rarely verified. This is problematic as any violation of these assumptions can lead to systematic biases. This makes it hard, if not impossible, to compare results across data sets or instruments with different noise characteristics. We revisit the fundamental question of how to quantify detection limits in HCI. We focus our analysis on the error budget resulting from violated assumptions. To this end, we propose a new metric based on bootstrapping that generalizes current standards to non-Gaussian noise. We apply our method to archival HCI data from the NACO instrument at the Very Large Telescope and derive detection limits for different types of noise. Our analysis shows that current standards tend to give detection limits that are about one magnitude too optimistic in the speckle-dominated regime. That is, HCI surveys may have excluded planets that can still exist.https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-3881/acc93cAstrostatisticsBootstrapDirect imagingHigh angular resolution |
| spellingShingle | Markus J. Bonse Emily O. Garvin Timothy D. Gebhard Felix A. Dannert Faustine Cantalloube Gabriele Cugno Olivier Absil Jean Hayoz Julien Milli Markus Kasper Sascha P. Quanz Comparing Apples with Apples: Robust Detection Limits for Exoplanet High-contrast Imaging in the Presence of Non-Gaussian Noise The Astronomical Journal Astrostatistics Bootstrap Direct imaging High angular resolution |
| title | Comparing Apples with Apples: Robust Detection Limits for Exoplanet High-contrast Imaging in the Presence of Non-Gaussian Noise |
| title_full | Comparing Apples with Apples: Robust Detection Limits for Exoplanet High-contrast Imaging in the Presence of Non-Gaussian Noise |
| title_fullStr | Comparing Apples with Apples: Robust Detection Limits for Exoplanet High-contrast Imaging in the Presence of Non-Gaussian Noise |
| title_full_unstemmed | Comparing Apples with Apples: Robust Detection Limits for Exoplanet High-contrast Imaging in the Presence of Non-Gaussian Noise |
| title_short | Comparing Apples with Apples: Robust Detection Limits for Exoplanet High-contrast Imaging in the Presence of Non-Gaussian Noise |
| title_sort | comparing apples with apples robust detection limits for exoplanet high contrast imaging in the presence of non gaussian noise |
| topic | Astrostatistics Bootstrap Direct imaging High angular resolution |
| url | https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-3881/acc93c |
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