Graduate student Armaan Goyal along with Professor Songhu Wang have recently published the results of their research on exoplanets in multiple-planet systems in the Astrophysical Journal. They have studied 17 exoplanet systems where planet masses are determined from radial velocity measurements, finding that the planets in these non-resonant systems tend to have strikingly similar masses. This result complements previous findings that near-resonant planetary systems also have very similar masses, implying that this mass similarity may be a general property of exoplanet systems, regardless of resonance. Goyal and Wang also suggest, based on their analysis, that planet systems with more unequal masses may preferentially form from more massive planet-forming disks. Nice work, Armaan!
The College of Arts