Since close-orbiting hot Jupiters are expected to be gradually spiralling inwards, under the influence of tidal interactions with their stars, and since, in addition, the influence of extra, unseen planets in the system could cause changes in transit times, many groups worldwide are monitoring timings of transits of WASP planets.

The latest report on timings of WASP-19b has just been announced by Petrucci et al. The result is the following diagram, showing deviations of timings from a constant ephemeris, plotted against cycle number.

The upshot is that there is no indication of any period change, which then puts limits on how efficient the tidal bulges, caused by the gravitational interaction of the planet with the star, are at dissipating energy.

It is notable, however, that there is clear scatter about the constant-period line, beyond that expected from the error bars on the timings. This means either that the error bars are under-estimating the uncertainties (as would occur if “red noise” in the lightcurves is unaccounted for), or that there is astrophysically real scatter in the timings, perhaps caused by magnetic activity (star spots) on the surface of the star being transited. We need to better understand such timing scatter if we are to be able to judge whether claims of period changes are actually real.