Kepler Mission Options

[djellison]

That very subject has been discussed in this very thread already.

[Syrinx]

Back online.

http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/kepler/n...m-20110321.html

Hopefully this was the "safe event to end all safe events" (the new firmware will cure the star tracker issue).

[ngunn]

I'm not sure when this amazing digram was first released. Possibly someone has already posted a more direct link to it. Anyhow I've only just spotted it on yesterday's APOD, so for anyone else who hasn't already seen it here it is: http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap110329.html

[Explorer1]

Amazing!
Roger Ebert posted it too (not perfectly described, but nice to see it shown anyway): http://blogs.suntimes.com/ebert/2011/03/a_...ce_of_dust.html

[nprev]

It's a profound image indeed, and it will resonate.

[DFinfrock]

It's a profound image indeed, and it will resonate.

Yes it will. It points out how very average and run-of-the mill our sun and Jupiter are. In the big scheme of things, our solar system is nothing special.

[eoincampbell]

Thank you very much, ngunn for bringing that brilliant illustration to light!, I'm eclipsed!

[Syrinx]

In the big scheme of things, our solar system is nothing special.

Your succinct statement is utterly depressing and amazingly inspiring, simultaneously. Here we are alive in 2011 between "ignorant" and "able". All we have is UMSF .

[Paolo]

For those with access to Science, there are a few Kepler results published in tomorrow's issue:
Kepler Detected Gravity-Mode Period Spacings in a Red Giant Star
Ensemble Asteroseismology of Solar-Type Stars with the NASA Kepler Mission
HD 181068: A Red Giant in a Triply Eclipsing Compact Hierarchical Triple System

[stevesliva]

Kepler releases on at least two of the three:

Echoes from depth of Red Giant
Triply Eclipsing Triple Star System

Edit, make that 3/3:
Kepler listens to chorus of stars

[marsophile]

Is there any way that Kepler could detect an asteroid belt (analogous to the one between Mars and Jupiter) around other stars? That may not be directly observable via the transit method, but is there any way of obtaining indirect evidence?

[Drkskywxlt]

Is there any way that Kepler could detect an asteroid belt (analogous to the one between Mars and Jupiter) around other stars? That may not be directly observable via the transit method, but is there any way of obtaining indirect evidence?

I don't think so...several studies have looked at whether Kepler could detect moons, rings or trojans of any detected planets, and the answer is more or less "yes given certain conditions" (e.g., very large moon/trojan-to-planet ratio) with either direct imaging or transit-timing variations. If you had an Earth analogue with an asteroid-belt analogue, without doing the math to confirm, I'd wager big money that there's very little variation in Earth's orbit due to asteroids. I'm not sure even Jupiter could be inferred if an alien Kepler was looking at transit timing variations of Earth.

Not to mention you'd need a large sample of transits to build up a statistically significant sample, and for an Earth analogue, Kepler probably will only get ~3 transits.

[Hungry4info]

I'm not sure even Jupiter could be inferred if an alien Kepler was looking at transit timing variations of Earth.

Only because of Jupiter's long orbital period. Given a long-enough baseline, the transit timing variations would be detectable, I believe.

[Drkskywxlt]

Exactly. Over a nominal 3-5 year mission, you couldn't detect variations from Jupiter. I don't know how long you'd exactly need, but it would have to be at least 10-15 years to get 2-3 orbits of Jupiter "observed".

[stevesliva]

Any earthish planets with an annual occultation would certainly be watched after the mission end. Why does the mission timeframe matter for ferreting out that sort of thing?