Climate variations on Earth-like circumbinary planets

Max Popp, Siegfried Eggl

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract

The discovery of planets orbiting double stars at close distances has sparked increasing scientific interest in determining whether Earth-Analogues can remain habitable in such environments and how their atmospheric dynamics is influenced by the rapidly changing insolation. In this work we present results of the first three-dimensional numerical experiments of a water-rich planet orbiting a double star. We find that the periodic forcing of the atmosphere has a noticeable impact on the planet's climate. Signatures of the forcing frequencies related to the planet's as well as to the binary's orbital periods are present in a variety of climate indicators such as temperature and precipitation, making the interpretation of potential observables challenging. However, for Earth-like greenhouse gas concentrations, the variable forcing does not change the range of insolation values allowing for habitable climates substantially.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Article number14957
JournalNature communications
Volume8
DOIs
StatePublished - Apr 6 2017
Externally publishedYes

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • General Chemistry
  • General Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology
  • General Physics and Astronomy

Fingerprint

Dive into the research topics of 'Climate variations on Earth-like circumbinary planets'. Together they form a unique fingerprint.

Cite this