Detecting Earth-Like Extra-Solar Planets from Antarctica by Gravitational Microlensing
Earth-like extra-solar planets may be detected with 1-2m class telescopes using the gravitational microlensing technique. The essential requirement is the ability to be able to carry out continuous observations of the galactic bulge. A telescope situated at Dome A or Dome C in Antarctica would be em...
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Format: | Report |
Language: | unknown |
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arXiv
2005
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Online Access: | https://dx.doi.org/10.48550/arxiv.astro-ph/0508603 https://arxiv.org/abs/astro-ph/0508603 |
Summary: | Earth-like extra-solar planets may be detected with 1-2m class telescopes using the gravitational microlensing technique. The essential requirement is the ability to be able to carry out continuous observations of the galactic bulge. A telescope situated at Dome A or Dome C in Antarctica would be eminently suitable. Two possible observing strategies are described here. One employs a 1m visible (V and I passbands) telescope, the other a 2m wide-field near infrared telescope. Either telescope could allow a rough measurement of the abundance of Earth-like planets in the Milky Way to be made in a few years. Useful measurements could also be made on stellar atmospheres. : 9 pages, 2 figures, to appear in Acta Astronomica Sinica in Proc. Conf. on Wide Field Telescope on Dome C/A, Beijing, June 2005 |
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