Non-local thermal equilibrium spectra of atmospheric molecules for exoplanets

Here we present a study of non-local thermodynamic equilibrium (LTE) effects on the exoplanetary spectra of a collection of molecules that are key in the investigation of exoplanet atmospheres: water, methane, carbon monoxide, and titanium oxide. These molecules are chosen as examples of different spectral ranges (infrared and ultraviolet), molecular types (diatomics and polyatomics), and spectral types (electronic and rovibrational); the importance of different vibrational bands in forming distinct non-LTE spectral features is investigated. Most notably, such key spectral signatures for distinguishing between the LTE and non-LTE cases include: for CH₄ the 3.15 μm band region; for H₂O the 2.0 and 2.7 μm band regions; for TiO, a strong variation in intensity in the bands between 0.5 and 0.75 μm; and a sole CO signature between 5 and 6 μm. The analysis is based on the ExoMol cross-sections and takes advantage of the extensive vibrational assignment of these molecular line lists in the ExoMol data base. We examine LTE and non-LTE cross-sections under conditions consistent with those on WASP-12b and WASP-76b using the empirically motivated bi-temperature Treanor model.

An example variation between the LTE case and Non-LTE case with our approach can be seen here for an important Methane band shown at high resolution and low pressure: