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William Thompson

@wrtastro.bsky.social

Herzberg Instrument Science Fellow at the National Research Council in Victoria, Canada. Imaging exoplanets and writing #JuliaLang tools.

121 Posts1111 Follower355 Folgt
William Thompson@wrtastro.bsky.social · last yr.

Octofitter v7, now released! This release overhauls the modelling syntax and add some powerful new capabilities for advanced users. [1/4] (Octofitter is a package for Bayesian modelling of exoplanet orbits)

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Brett Morris@brettmorr.is · last yr.

The brightest star in Scorpius, Antares, is nearing the end of its 15 million year life. It's so large that the orbits of Mercury, Venus, Earth and Mars would be inside the star. 🔭🧪 Pilate et al. published brightness maps of the star, showing gigantic convective cells. arxiv.org/abs/2507.08614

Relative brightness maps of Antares over the course of a year, showing the changing brightness and shapes of convective cells in the stellar photosphere.
Heidi B. Hammel@hbhammel.bsky.social · last yr.

Astonishing new videos of the Sun show coronal "rain" in (pink-tinted) hydrogen-alpha light. Obtained with advanced adaptive optics research supported by NSF, the National Solar Observatory, and New Jersey Institute of Technology. Details and more videos in the link in the first comment below.

William Thompson@wrtastro.bsky.social · last yr.

Octofitter v6 just released! 🐙 * Overhauled Hipparcos / Gaia modelling * Multi-planet epicycle approximation * Include astrometric jitter, north angle, and plate-scale uncertainties * Dynamical priors (prevent crossing) * Celerite gaussian processes Much more! (fig. credit in reply) #exoplanets 🔭

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Space Telescope Science Institute@stsci.edu · last yr.

The James Webb Space Telescope imaged young, giant exoplanets and detected carbon dioxide! The findings suggest that the giant exoplanets in the HR 8799 system likely formed like Jupiter and Saturn. (1/5) 🔭 🧪 🧵

This image shows the planetary system HR 8799. The background is black. At the center there is a symbol representing a star labeled HR 8799. The star’s light is blocked. There are four exoplanets, which look like fuzzy dots, pictured surrounding the star. Furthest from the star is a fuzzy, faint blue dot, labeled b, at the 10 o’clock position. At the 1 o’clock position, second furthest from the star is a blueish-white fuzzy dot labeled c. Just below that is an orange dot labeled e. At the 4 o’clock position, still near the star, is another fuzzy white dot labeled d.
William Thompson@wrtastro.bsky.social · last yr.

This is fantastic news. Upping grad and postdoc awards (both stipend and amount), and finally allowing non-Canadian/PRs to apply.

Dr Dan Shugar 🇨🇦@watershedlab.bsky.social · last yr.

🚨 HUGE news from Canada's tricouncils who are harmonizing their scholarship & fellowship programs, upping the total number (huzzah!), and critically, allowing foreigners to apply for doctoral and postdoc fellowships. Want to work with me? Get in touch! 🇨🇦🧪⚒️ www.nserc-crsng.gc.ca/NewsDetail-D...

William Thompson@wrtastro.bsky.social · last yr.

Time for the promised thread on ε Eridani b! I should emphasize this manuscript is a submitted draft—comments from the community are very welcome. Bottom line: ε Eri b is likely a 1.0 Jupiter-mass planet, only 3.2pc away, on a 3.55 AU near-circular orbit, ~aligned with its debris disk. 🔭🪐🧪 [1/7]

Figure showing a the plausible orbits for Eps Eri b, and a panel showing the scale of the orbits relative to the outer debris disk model of Booth et al.A three panel figure showing the statistical distribution of inclination versus mass for the planet, broken down by seven different combinations of data. The scatter points follow an m*sin(i) curve, except for a series that does not include any RV data. A small black concentrated region shows the full model, with 1 and 3 sigma contours. The planet's mass is quoted at 0.98 +- 0.09 Mjup, and inclination as 41 +- 7 degrees.