The M Star Planet Population - Bridging the Gap between Observations and Theory

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Planet population synthesis is a very powerful tool in advancing our understanding of planet formation and evolution. In principle, it can tell us how each of the underlying mechanisms involved in forming planets, such as planetesimal formation or planet-disk interactions, affects the final population of planets. Additionally, it not only helps to understand the observed planet diversity, but it can also tell us about the population of planets which escape detection with current instruments so far. As such, the combination of planet population synthesis simulations with a complete set of observations is the ultimate goal of a planet search survey such as CARMENES.While each individual discovery is a great success, often the result of cutting edge instrument capabilities and elaborate statistical methods, it is also often just one more of the same. In general many planet discoveries taken together possess more constraining power on planet formation theory.In order to be successful, planet population synthesis must bring together the results of theoretical calculations and observations.For the comparison, it is critical to take selection biases in the underlying observed sample of stars as well as detection limits, i.e. the sensitivity of the applied observational strategies to certain kind of planetary systems, into account. This implies that population synthesis can only be applied to surveys for which the selection biases and detection limits are fairly well-known, and homogeneous across the survey. Thus, the CARMENES survey is predestined for planet population synthesis, since it is one of very few surveys which were designed from the very beginning with the goal of characterizing the planet population around M stars in a statistical way.