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Transit

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Encyclopedia of Astrobiology

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Definition

In astronomy, a transit is the occurrence, as seen by an external observer, of a partial eclipse of a body (star, planet) by another body (star, planet) orbiting the first one. The transit refers to the entire duration of the phenomenon. Historically, the observations of the transit of Venus in front of the Sun as seen from Earth, and especially the ones in 1761 and 1769, have been the occasion to measure the Sun–Earth distance with a fair accuracy. The last transit of Venus across the Sun was in 2012.

The transit phenomenon presents a powerful method for detecting extrasolar planets. Thanks to the Keplerspace telescope and now the TESS and CHEOPS satellites and many ground-based instruments (e.g., HATNet, MEarth, SPECULOOS), this method has been able to detect close to 2400 extrasolar planets. The transit of an extrasolar planet in front of its host star is also used to determine several of the planet’s parameters such as its radius, period, and eccentricity. It is also...

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, Cambridge, MA, USA

    David W. Latham

  2. Institute for Astronomy, University of Hawaii-Manoa, Honolulu, Hawaii, HI, USA

    Nader Haghighipour

Authors
  1. David W. Latham
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  2. Nader Haghighipour
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Correspondence to David W. Latham .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Laboratoire d'Astrophysique de Bordeaux, University of Bordeaux, Pessac CX, France

    Muriel Gargaud

  2. Department of Astronomy, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, MA, USA

    William M. Irvine

  3. Centro Biología Molecular Severo Ochoa, Univ. Autónoma de Madrid Cantoblanco, Madrid, Spain

    Ricardo Amils

  4. Analytical-, Environm., Geo-Chemistry, Vrije Universiteit Brussel, VUB, Brussels, Belgium

    Philippe Claeys

  5. Earth-Life Science Institute, Tokyo Institute of Technology, WASHINGTON, DC, USA

    Henderson James Cleaves

  6. Radio Astronomy, Paris Observatory, Paris, France

    Maryvonne Gerin

  7. Observatoire de Paris-Meudon, Meudon, France

    Daniel Rouan

  8. International Space Science Institute, Bern, Bern, Switzerland

    Tilman Spohn

  9. Centre Francois Viète, Universite de Nantes, Nantes, France

    Stéphane Tirard

  10. Innovaxiom, Paris CX, France

    Michel Viso

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© 2021 This is a U.S. Government work and not under copyright protection in the U.S.; foreign copyright protection may apply

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Latham, D.W., Haghighipour, N. (2021). Transit. In: Gargaud, M., et al. Encyclopedia of Astrobiology. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-27833-4_1603-5

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-27833-4_1603-5

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-642-27833-4

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-642-27833-4

  • eBook Packages: Springer Reference Physics and AstronomyReference Module Physical and Materials ScienceReference Module Chemistry, Materials and Physics

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Chapter history

  1. Latest

    Transit
    Published:
    27 July 2022

    DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-27833-4_1603-5

  2. Original

    Transit
    Published:
    03 May 2015

    DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-27833-4_1603-4

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