Kepler follow-up observation program. I. Imaging

The true fraction of systems with close (<~4'') companions is larger than the observed one due to the limited sensitivities of the imaging data. We derive correction factors for planet radii caused by the dilution of the transit depth: assuming that planets orbit the primary stars or the brightest companion stars, the average correction factors are 1.06 and 3.09, respectively. The true effect of transit dilution lies in between these two cases and varies with each system.

Applying these factors to planet radii decreases the number of KOI planets with radii smaller than 2R_{Earth}_ by ~2%-23% and thus affects planet occurrence rates. This effect will also be important for the yield of small planets from future transit missions such as TESS.