Chair of Theoretical Astrophysics of Extrasolar Planets

Research Groups

Team meetings (including visitors), seminars & Master projects

• Team Meetings: Wednesdays from 09:00 to 10:30 (observatory lecture hall)
  • Detailed schedule, program and lineup of visitors/speakers
• Geosciences of Exoplanets for Astrophysicists Seminar: Wednesdays from 14:00 to 15:30 (observatory 1OG seminar room and sometimes in Geosciences Department building)
  • Description, schedule and program
• Bayesian Inference and Artificial Intelligence Seminar: Thursday from 09:15 to 11:00
  • Description, schedule and program
• Master Projects Offered in Chair
  • List of project titles, supervisors and abstracts

News from the Munich Exoplanet Chair

Recent Publications

• Understanding the surfaces of rocky exoplanets requires accurately interpreting how they reflect and emit light. In this study, we highlight an important optical phenomenon known as the opposition surge, a brightening effect that occurs when a planet’s surface is viewed at certain angles, due to how light interacts with fine surface grains. While well documented for the Moon and asteroids, this effect has been largely overlooked in exoplanet research. Leonardos Gkouvelis present a new formulation to simulate this brightening in a way that more reliably captures the underlying physics. With current observational capabilities now able to study rocky exoplanets in greater detail, accounting for this effect is essential. Our work lays the groundwork for more accurate tools to reveal the true nature of distant rocky worlds.
  
  • An Analytical Model of Wavelength-dependent Opposition Surge in Emittance and Reflectance Spectroscopy of Airless Rocky Exoplanets

• A study led by David Cont on TOI-2109b, an ultra-hot Jupiter in an unexplored thermal regime, has recently been accepted for publication in the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics. The study focuses on characterizing the planet’s thermochemical and dynamical properties in its day- and nightside hemispheres. The analysis combines high-resolution spectroscopy from VLT/CRIRES+ and CAHA/CARMENES via cross-correlation and atmospheric retrieval techniques.
  • Retrieving day- and nightside atmospheric properties of the ultra-hot Jupiter TOI-2109b

Congratulation Dr. Osborne!!

Congratulations to Hannah Osborne who passed her viva on June 10, 2025 at MSSL, UK. Hannah’s work on radial velocity measurements of small exoplanets was in part executed with co-supervisor Louise Nielsen at ESO and USM in 2023 and 2024. The first of two papers coming out of this project can be found here: https://www.aanda.org/articles/aa/pdf/2025/01/aa52127-24.pdf.

Dr. Osborne will continue her pursuit of discerning the true nature of sub-Neptunes as a research fellow at ESO in Chile. Well done Hannah!