Over the last two decades, hundreds of transiting giant planets have been detected. However, only a few of them are orbiting M dwarfs even if M dwarfs are the most abundant stars in our Milky Way. With the highest planet-to-star mass ratios of any type of planetary systems, giant planets around M dwarfs are extreme cases that serve as sensitive probes of planet formation and bridges between theories for star and planet formation. In this talk, I will introduce the GPASS (Giant Planets Around Small Stars) program that I lead, including a recent confirmation of TOI-4201b, the most massive hot Jupiter around an M dwarf known so far. I will present our statistical studies on the mass ratio and stellar metallicity distribution as well as the occurrence rate of such systems. I will compare the observational results with predictions from theoretical works and investigate the formation channel. In addition, I will also present our preliminary result on the systematic search for transiting giant planets around M dwarfs with four-year TESS data. Finally, I will discuss the origins of hot Jupiters around M dwarfs and the prospects in the TESS, JWST and Gaia era.

Host: Suvrath Mahadevan

Seminar held in 538 Davey or please email CEHW-SEMINAR-QUESTIONS@lists.psu.edu to attend virtually.