Riley Smith, ISU Physics and Astronomy Department Graduate Student
In my talk I will review a paper by Wolter et al. (2009, A&A, 504, 561) who analyzed variations in the transit lightcurves of CoRoT-2b, a massive hot Jupiter orbiting a highly active G star. This group used one transit lightcurve to eclipse-map a photospheric spot occulted by the planet, and determined the size and longitude of the eclipsed portion of the starspot. I will summarize the observations and data analysis techniques used in this study, as well as discuss the future potential of eclipse mapping by planetary transits for the high-resolution analysis of stellar surface features.
