Realistic limitations of detecting planets around young active stars

¹ Institut fur Astrophysik, Georg-August Universitat Goettingen, Friedrich-Hund-Platz 1, 37077 Goettingen, Germany
² Centre for Astrophysics Research, University of Hertfordshire, College Lane, Hatfield, Herts AL10 9AB, UK

^a e-mail: jeffers@astro.uni-goettingen.de

Abstract

Current planet hunting methods using the radial velocity method are limited to observing middle-aged main-sequence stars where the signatures of stellar activity are much less than on young stars that have just arrived on the main-sequence. In this work we apply our knowledge from the surface imaging of these young stars to place realistic limitations on the possibility of detecting orbiting planets. In general we find that the magnitude of the stellar jitter is directly proportional to the stellar vsini. For G and K dwarfs, we find that it is possible, for models with high stellar activity and low stellar vsini, to be able to detect a 1 M_Jupiter mass planet within 50 epochs of observations and for the M dwarfs it is possible to detect a habitable zone Earth-like planet in 10s of observational epochs.