CHEOPS’s hunt for exocomets: photometric observations of 5 Vul

Abstract

ABSTRACT The presence of minor bodies in exoplanetary systems is in most cases inferred through infrared excesses, with the exception of exocomets. Even if over 35 yr have passed since the first detection of exocomets around β Pic, only ∼25 systems are known to show evidence of evaporating bodies, and most of them have only been observed in spectroscopy. With the appearance of new high-precision photometric missions designed to search for exoplanets, such as CHEOPS, a new opportunity to detect exocomets is available. Combining data from CHEOPS and TESS we investigate the light-curve of 5 Vul, an A-type star with detected variability in spectroscopy, to search for non-periodic transits that could indicate the presence of dusty cometary tails in the system. While we did not find any evidence of minor bodies, the high precision of the data, along with the combination with previous spectroscopic results and models, allows for an estimation of the sizes and spatial distribution of the exocomets.