HAT-P-16b: A 4 MJ planet transiting a bright star on an eccentric orbit

Abstract

We report the discovery of HAT-P-16b, a transiting extrasolar planet orbiting the V = 10.8 mag F8 dwarf GSC 2792-01700, with a period P = 2.775960 ± 0.000003 days, transit epoch Tc = 2455027.59293 ± 0.00031 (BJD10), and transit duration 0.1276 ± 0.0013 days. The host star has a mass of 1.22 ± 0.04 M⊙, radius of 1.24 ± 0.05 R⊙, effective temperature 6158 ± 80 K, and metallicity [Fe/H] = +0.17 ± 0.08. The planetary companion has a mass of 4.193 ± 0.094 MJ and radius of 1.289 ± 0.066 RJ, yielding a mean density of 2.42 ± 0.35 gcm-3. Comparing these observed characteristics with recent theoretical models, we find that HAT-P-16b is consistent with a 1 Gyr H/He-dominated gas giant planet. HAT-P-16b resides in a sparsely populated region of the mass-radius diagram and has a non-zero eccentricity of e = 0.036 with a significance of 10σ. © 2010. The American Astronomical Society. All rights reserved. Printed in the U.S.A.