A JWST Transit of a Jupiter Analog I: Constraints on the Oblateness of Kepler-167e

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Main Authors: Cassese, Ben, Kipping, David, Changeat, Quentin, Yahalomi, Daniel A., Vega, Justin, Chachan, Yayaati, Edwards, Billy, Teachey, Alex
Format: Preprint
Published: 2025
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_version_ 1866915733646082048
author Cassese, Ben
Kipping, David
Changeat, Quentin
Yahalomi, Daniel A.
Vega, Justin
Chachan, Yayaati
Edwards, Billy
Teachey, Alex
author_facet Cassese, Ben
Kipping, David
Changeat, Quentin
Yahalomi, Daniel A.
Vega, Justin
Chachan, Yayaati
Edwards, Billy
Teachey, Alex
contents In October 2024 JWST observed a transit of Kepler-167e, a Jupiter-analog planet on a 1000+ day orbit. These observations, recorded over a long baseline of nearly 60 hours, were designed to search for signatures of planetary oblateness and/or exomoons comparable to Ganymede. In this first in a series of studies analyzing these data we report on constraints on Kepler-167e's oblateness. We explored a large grid of data reduction pipelines and modeling choices, including a new entirely independent reduction pipeline ("katahdin") and two new treatments for limb darkening. We find that under a Bayesian model comparison framework the data are fit equally well by both spherical and oblate planet models, and that our ability to constrain the oblateness is negatively impacted by the influence of exposure-long trends. Using the most conservative of our posteriors, we place a 95% upper bound on the projected oblateness of $f<0.097$, which corresponds to a rotation period of $P\geq7.11$ hours if the planet's spin axis is aligned with the sky plane. We note, however, that the final bound depends on the choice of reduction pipeline and systematics model, and that our suite of end-to-end analyses produced bounds as low as $f<0.065$ at 95%. We conclude that leveraging JWST to make tighter constraints on planetary oblateness will require further investigation into mitigating exposure-long trends and correlated noise.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2511_02067
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle A JWST Transit of a Jupiter Analog I: Constraints on the Oblateness of Kepler-167e
Cassese, Ben
Kipping, David
Changeat, Quentin
Yahalomi, Daniel A.
Vega, Justin
Chachan, Yayaati
Edwards, Billy
Teachey, Alex
Earth and Planetary Astrophysics
In October 2024 JWST observed a transit of Kepler-167e, a Jupiter-analog planet on a 1000+ day orbit. These observations, recorded over a long baseline of nearly 60 hours, were designed to search for signatures of planetary oblateness and/or exomoons comparable to Ganymede. In this first in a series of studies analyzing these data we report on constraints on Kepler-167e's oblateness. We explored a large grid of data reduction pipelines and modeling choices, including a new entirely independent reduction pipeline ("katahdin") and two new treatments for limb darkening. We find that under a Bayesian model comparison framework the data are fit equally well by both spherical and oblate planet models, and that our ability to constrain the oblateness is negatively impacted by the influence of exposure-long trends. Using the most conservative of our posteriors, we place a 95% upper bound on the projected oblateness of $f<0.097$, which corresponds to a rotation period of $P\geq7.11$ hours if the planet's spin axis is aligned with the sky plane. We note, however, that the final bound depends on the choice of reduction pipeline and systematics model, and that our suite of end-to-end analyses produced bounds as low as $f<0.065$ at 95%. We conclude that leveraging JWST to make tighter constraints on planetary oblateness will require further investigation into mitigating exposure-long trends and correlated noise.
title A JWST Transit of a Jupiter Analog I: Constraints on the Oblateness of Kepler-167e
topic Earth and Planetary Astrophysics
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2511.02067