Program: GS-2022A-Q-206

We propose to use IGRINS to take high-resolution transit observations of the archetypal sub-Neptune exoplanet, GJ 1214b, in order to detect molecular species in its atmosphere for the first time. Though many planets larger than Earth but smaller than Neptune have been detected, their atmospheres have proven difficult to characterize due to hazes or clouds that mute features in their spectra. However, high-resolution spectroscopy (R >= 25,000) enables us to probe the regions in these atmospheres above the clouds where the cores of the strongest spectral lines are formed. A detection with IGRINS would make GJ 1214b the first exoplanet smaller than Neptune successfully characterized with high-resolution spectroscopy. Our recent paper (Hood et al. 2020) demonstrates that IGRINS on Gemini South is now capable of detecting molecules in the atmosphere of GJ 1214b.