Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite |
Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite |
Apr 6 2013, 10:10 AM
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 1729 Joined: 3-August 06 From: 43° 35' 53" N 1° 26' 35" E Member No.: 1004 |
a new Explorer satellite dedicated to exoplanets around near stars
NASA Selects Explorer Investigations for Formulation |
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Apr 10 2013, 06:52 PM
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#2
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 2530 Joined: 20-April 05 Member No.: 321 |
TESS will look for exoplanets around nearby stars. The catch with the transiting method is that geometry doesn't do us any favors: Any planets which don't transit can't be seen, and the farther the planet is from the star, the less likely a favorable alignment is.
The probability of a transit varies from over 20% for planets with periods of a few days to less than 1% for planets at a distance of about 1 AU. So even if 100% of stars have a planet at 1 AU, you'd have to monitor hundreds of stars to see a few such planets. And when you talk about hundreds of stars, you're no longer talking about "nearby." Kepler addresses this by looking at many stars farther away -- Kepler stars are basically between about 500 and 6500 light years away. TESS will monitor about two million stars looking for planets with periods of less than two months. Once such systems are identified, that'll provide many promising leads for follow-on studies with other instruments. |
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Lo-Fi Version | Time is now: 17th May 2024 - 02:35 AM |
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