NICER observation list: Target ID 354101

Understanding the magnitude and timescale of planetary evaporation is critical to addressing the recent discovery of a gap in the radius distribution of super-Earth sized planets. V1298 Tau is a 23 million year old star that hosts four transiting Neptune and Jupiter sized planets. Its brightness, combined with the frequent transits, makes this a benchmark system for studying the atmospheres of very young planets and getting a grip on early evaporation rates. Estimates of mass loss, however, are highly dependent on the star's X-ray flux. We propose to use NICER to measure the soft X-ray spectrum of V1298 Tau in order to estimate the evaporation rates of the four transiting short-period planets. The spectrum will also be useful in modeling future observations of the planets' atmospheres.