Kepler Mission Options

[imran]

This NASA Discovery mission is to be launched in June 2008 and will search for Earth-size and smaller planets. Launch was originally scheduled in 2007 but delayed by 8 months due to "funding constraints".

Here's the official web site:
http://www.kepler.arc.nasa.gov/

[PhilHorzempa]

This is targeted at those with some familiarity with sources of Astronomical
images. I am including links to the planned Field of View (FOV) for the Kepler
mission. The first page links to a brief description of the FOV's location, while
the second link is a more detailed pdf of the FOV itself.

http://kepler.nasa.gov/sci/basis/fov.html

http://kepler.nasa.gov/sci/basis/images/New_FOV_6m.pdf



What I am looking for would be telescope images of the FOV, showing the
star fields in some detail. I have searched the Kepler web site, but there are
no such telescopic photos there. I think that is a shame. Kepler's mission involves
searching for extra-solar planetary transits using a fancy photometer. The resulting
light curves will be great to analyze, but the public (including me) will want to
see just what Kepler was looking at.

I think that a mosaic of images of the target FOV Milky Way star field should
be magnificent. To me, such public outreach should be something that the Kepler
team would want to pursue.


Another Phil

[Guest_BruceMoomaw_*]

This is targeted at those with some familiarity with sources of Astronomical
images. I am including links to the planned Field of View (FOV) for the Kepler
mission. The first page links to a brief description of the FOV's location, while
the second link is a more detailed pdf of the FOV itself.

http://kepler.nasa.gov/sci/basis/fov.html

http://kepler.nasa.gov/sci/basis/images/New_FOV_6m.pdf
What I am looking for would be telescope images of the FOV, showing the
star fields in some detail. I have searched the Kepler web site, but there are
no such telescopic photos there. I think that is a shame. Kepler's mission involves
searching for extra-solar planetary transits using a fancy photometer. The resulting
light curves will be great to analyze, but the public (including me) will want to
see just what Kepler was looking at.

I think that a mosaic of images of the target FOV Milky Way star field should
be magnificent. To me, such public outreach should be something that the Kepler
team would want to pursue.
Another Phil

I believe that they do intend to get a lot of data on star variability as a fringe benefit from the Kepler mission -- just as ESA's cancelled Eddington mission would have done the same two things, but in reverse order of priority.

By the way, one selling point for the proposed "Joint Dark Energy Mission" that NASA and the Dept. of Energy were planning to team up on as the first "Beyond Einstein" mission -- although those have been put on indefinite hold due to the serious funding problems in NASA's Astrophysics Division -- was that, by adding just $100 million to its total cost, it could follow up its initial measurements of very distant supernovas with a very extensive microlensing census of planets in one of the Magellanic Clouds.