Published in

Nature Research, Nature Communications, 1(8), 2017

DOI: 10.1038/ncomms14957

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Climate variations on Earth-like circumbinary planets

Journal article published in 2017 by Max Popp, Siegfried Eggl ORCID
This paper is made freely available by the publisher.
This paper is made freely available by the publisher.

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Abstract

AbstractThe discovery of planets orbiting double stars at close distances has sparked increasing scientific interest in determining whether Earth-analogues can remain habitable in such environments and how their atmospheric dynamics is influenced by the rapidly changing insolation. In this work we present results of the first three-dimensional numerical experiments of a water-rich planet orbiting a double star. We find that the periodic forcing of the atmosphere has a noticeable impact on the planet’s climate. Signatures of the forcing frequencies related to the planet’s as well as to the binary’s orbital periods are present in a variety of climate indicators such as temperature and precipitation, making the interpretation of potential observables challenging. However, for Earth-like greenhouse gas concentrations, the variable forcing does not change the range of insolation values allowing for habitable climates substantially.