Detecting Earth-analogs with radial velocities and photometry

Abstract:
Understanding how planets form and searching for life beyond Earth are two key goals in exoplanet research. To make progress on both fronts, it is crucial to discover Earth analogs. However, detecting them is a major challenge, as their faint signals are difficult to disentangle from astrophysical and instrumental noise. In this talk, I will present new data analysis techniques that significantly enhance the detectability of Earth analogs, and discuss the recent discovery of HD 20794 c, a 5.8M🜨 minimum mass crossing the habitable zone of a nearby star. Additionally, I will show that the methods developed for exoplanets can benefit other areas of astronomy—in particular how new stellar variability models open a new way to perform Doppler imaging.