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Description
We report the discovery of HAT-P-15b, a transiting extrasolar planet in the "period valley," a relatively sparsely populated period regime of the known extrasolar planets. The host star, GSC 2883-01687, is a G5 dwarf with V=12.16. It has a mass of 1.01+/-0.04M_{sun}_, radius of 1.08+/-0.04R_{sun}_, effective temperature 5568+/-90K, and metallicity [Fe/H]=+0.22+/-0.08. The planetary companion orbits the star with a period P=10.863502+/-0.000027 days, transit epoch T_c_=2454638.56019+/-0.00048(BJD), and transit duration 0.2285+/-0.0015days. It has a mass of 1.946+/-0.066M_J_ and radius of 1.072+/-0.043R_J_ yielding a mean density of 1.96+/-0.22g/cm^3^. At an age of 6.8^+2.5^_-1.6_Gyr, the planet is H/He-dominated and theoretical models require about 2% (10M_{earth}_) worth of heavy elements to reproduce its measured radius. With an estimated equilibrium temperature of ~820K during transit, and ~1000K at occultation, HAT-P-15b is a potential candidate to study moderately cool planetary atmospheres by transmission and occultation spectroscopy.
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