Refined physical properties and g′, r′, i′, z′, J, H, K transmission spectrum of WASP-23b from the ground^⋆

¹ Max Planck Institute for Astronomy, Königstuhl 17, 69117 Heidelberg, Germany
e-mail: nikolay@astro.ex.ac.uk
² Astrophysics Group, School of Physics, University of Exeter, Stocker Road, EX4 4QL, Exeter, UK
³ Purple Mountain Observatory & Key Laboratory for Radio Astronomy, 2 West Beijing Road, 210008 Nanjing, PR China
⁴ Department of Astronomy & Astrophysics, University of California, Santa Cruz, CA 95064, USA
⁵ Astrophysics Group, Keele University, Newcastle-under-Lyme, ST5 5BG, UK

Received: 11 January 2013
Accepted: 14 March 2013

Abstract

Context. Multi-band observations of planetary transits using the telescope defocus technique may yield high-quality light curves suitable for refining the physical properties of exoplanets even with small or medium size telescopes. Such observations can be used to construct a broad-band transmission spectrum of transiting planets and search for the presence of strong absorbers.

Aims. We have thoroughly characterised the orbital ephemeris and physical properties of the transiting planet and host star in the WASP-23b system, constructed a broad-band transmission spectrum of WASP-23 b and performed a comparative analysis with theoretical models of hot Jupiters.

Methods. We observed a complete transit of WASP-23 b in seven passbands simultaneously, using the GROND instrument on the MPG/ESO 2.2 m telescope at La Silla Observatory and telescope defocussing. The optical data were taken in the Sloan g′, r′, i′ and z′ passbands. The resulting light curves are of high quality, with a root-mean-square scatter of the residual as low as 330 parts per million (ppm) in the z′-band, with a cadence of 90 s. Near-infrared data were obtained in the JHK passbands. We performed a MCMC analysis of our photometry plus existing radial velocity data to refine measurements of the ephemeris and physical properties of the WASP-23 system. We constructed a broad-band transmission spectrum of WASP-23 b and compared it with a theoretical transmission spectrum of a hot Jupiter.

Results. We measured the central transit time with a precision ~8 s. From this and earlier observations we obtain an orbital period of P = 2.9444300 ± 0.0000011 d. Our analysis also yielded a larger radius and mass for the planet (R_p = 1.067_-0.038^+0.045 R_Jup and M_p = 0.917_-0.039^+0.040 M_Jup) compared to previous estimates (R_p = 0.962_-0.056^+0.047 R_Jup and M_p = 0.884_-0.094^+0.088 M_Jup). The derived transmission spectrum is marginally flat, which is not surprising given the limited precision of the measurements for the planetary radius and the poor spectral resolution of the data.