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Abstract The elemental and isotopic abundances of volatiles like carbon, oxygen, and nitrogen may trace a planet’s formation location relative to H₂O, CO₂, CO, NH₃, and N₂“snowlines,” or the distance from the star at which these volatile elements sublimate. By comparing the C/O and¹²C/¹³C ratios measured in giant exoplanet atmospheres to complementary measurements of their host stars, we can determine whether the planet inherited stellar abundances from formation inside the volatile snowlines, or nonstellar C/O and¹³C enrichment characteristic of formation beyond the snowlines. To date, there are still only a handful of exoplanet systems where we can make a direct comparison of elemental and isotopic CNO abundances between an exoplanet and its host star. Here, we present a¹²C/¹³C abundance analysis for host star WASP-77A (whose hot Jupiter’s¹²C/¹³C abundance was recently measured). We use MARCS stellar atmosphere models and the radiative transfer code TurboSpectrum to generate synthetic stellar spectra for isotopic abundance calculations. We find a¹²C/¹³C ratio of 51 ± 6 for WASP-77A, which is subsolar (∼91) but may still indicate¹³C enrichment in its companion planet WASP-77A b (¹²C/¹³C = 26 ± 16, previously reported). Together with the inventory of carbon and oxygen abundances in both the host and companion planet, these chemical constraints point to WASP-77A b’s formation beyond the H₂O and CO₂snowlines and provide chemical evidence for the planet’s migration to its current location ∼0.024 au from its host star. 

Abstract The chemical abundance measurements of host stars and their substellar companions provide a powerful tool to trace the formation mechanism of the planetary systems. We present a detailed high-resolution spectroscopic analysis of a young M-type star, DH Tau A, which is located in the Taurus molecular cloud belonging to the Taurus-Auriga star-forming region. This star is host to a low-mass companion, DH Tau b, and both the star and the companion are still in their accreting phase. We apply our technique to measure the abundances of carbon and oxygen using carbon- and oxygen-bearing molecules, such as CO and OH, respectively. We determine a near-solar carbon-to-oxygen abundance ratio of C/O = 0.555 ± 0.063 for the host star DH Tau A. We compare this stellar abundance ratio with that of the companion from our previous study ( $\mathrm{C}/\mathrm{O}={0.54}_{-0.05}^{+0.06}$), which also has a near-solar value. This confirms the chemical homogeneity in the DH Tau system, which suggests a formation scenario for the companion consistent with a direct and relatively fast gravitational collapse rather than a slow core accretion process.