An adaptive optics search for young extrasolar planets

Details An adaptive optics search for young extrasolar planets An adaptive optics search for young extrasolar planets

Oct 2000

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2000dps....32.3211m&link_type=abstract

American Astronomical Society, DPS Meeting #32, #32.11; Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society, Vol. 32, p.1053

Physics

Optics

Scientific paper

In the past five years, many extrasolar planets have been detected indirectly, through radial velocity variations induced in their parent stars. Advances in technology now open up the possibility of directly detecting extrasolar planets through the photons they emit. Direct detection would allow determination of the temperature, radius, and composition of a planet, particularly one in a wide orbit - an important complement to radial velocity techniques. Seeing a planet against the halo of scattered light from its parent star is extremely challenging, but adaptive optics (AO) on 8-10 m telescopes can make this possible. The first such large-telescope AO system is now operational on the 10-m W.M. Keck II telescope. Its current performance is sufficient to detect objects at contrast ratios of 105 at separations of 1" and 106 at 2". This is insufficient to detect the reflected light from a mature Jupiter-like planet, but we can easily detect the near-infrared thermal emission from young (<10-50 MYr) planets, or older brown dwarfs. We are carrying out a search for such planetary companions to young nearby stars, including the TW Hydrae association. We present preliminary results from this survey, including sensitivity limits and follow-up of candidate companions originally detected by NICMOS. We have also imaged the Epsilon Eridani system, and present upper limits on the brightness of the planet detected via radial velocity variations by Cochran et al. This research was performed under the auspices of the U.S. Department of Energy by Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory under Contract W-7405-ENG-48, and also supported in part by the Center for Adaptive Optics under the STC Program of the National Science Foundation under Agreement No. AST-9876783

Affiliated with

Also associated with

No associations

Rating

An adaptive optics search for young extrasolar planets does not yet have a rating. At this time, there are no reviews or comments for this scientific paper.

If you have personal experience with An adaptive optics search for young extrasolar planets, we encourage you to share that experience with our LandOfFree.com community. Your opinion is very important and An adaptive optics search for young extrasolar planets will most certainly appreciate the feedback.

Rate now

Comments { 0 }

Profile ID: LFWR-SCP-O-866856