Identifying and Characterizing Infrared Excesses in the Spitzer Kepler Survey (SpiKeS)

Abstract

We report our search for infrared excesses in the Spitzer/Infrared Array Camera survey of the Kepler field at 3.6 and 4.5 μ m. The Spitzer Kepler Survey contains ∼190,000 targets, which we reduce to ∼117,000 targets after applying multiple filters to arrive at a high-quality sample for spectral energy distribution fitting. Of the ∼117,000, we find 11 Sun-like stars ( T _eff ∼ 6000 K) with infrared excesses of high significance (>4 σ ) ranging from 10% to 40% above the photosphere at 4.5 μ m, which is characteristic of debris disk systems. Blackbody fits of the infrared excesses for the 11 debris disk candidates suggest dust temperatures of 400–1400 K. None of the candidates have reported exoplanet detections. High-quality 1–5 μ m or longer spectra or photometry would be necessary to confirm the candidates as debris disk systems.

Keywords

• Debris disks
• Circumstellar disks
• Exoplanets
• Infrared excess
• Infrared astronomy