Weighing Planets by Benchmarking and Applying Transit Timing Tools

Observing young exoplanets is one of the most effective ways to study how planets form and evolve. These young planets also have a high likelihood for having transit timing variations (TTVs), which occurs when the gravitational pull of other nearby planets impacts the transit of another planet. In this project, we used TTVFast, an n-body simulator, to model TTV signals in order to calculate the masses of HIP 67522 b and c, the two planets that orbit the HIP 67522 star. Using telescope data from 11 different facilities, we found planet b to have a mass of 13.3 +/- 1.4 earth masses and planet c to have a mass of 14.19 +/- 0.96 earth masses. Our results add to the limited database of young exoplanets, which allows us to track planet formation patterns and see how HIP 67522 b and c fall in with other young exoplanets. Additionally, the success of this project provides a strong argument for TTV projects being good candidates for telescope time.