Kepler Mission Design, Realized Photometric Performance, and Early Science
Abstract
The Kepler Mission, launched on Mar 6, 2009 was designed with the explicit capability to detect Earth-size planets in the habitable zone of solar-like stars using the transit photometry method. Results from just forty-three days of data along with ground-based follow-up observations have identified five new transiting planets with measurements of their masses, radii, and orbital periods. Many aspects of stellar astrophysics also benefit from the unique, precise, extended and nearly continuous data set for a large number and variety of stars. Early results for classical variables and eclipsing stars show great promise. To fully understand the methodology, processes and eventually the results from the mission, we present the underlying rationale that ultimately led to the flight and ground system designs used to achieve the exquisite photometric performance. As an example of the initial photometric results, we present variability measurements that can be used to distinguish dwarf stars from red giants.
Keywords
Cite
@article{arxiv.1001.0268,
title = {Kepler Mission Design, Realized Photometric Performance, and Early Science},
author = {David G. Koch and William J. Borucki and Gibor Basri and Natalie M. Batalha and Timothy M. Brown and Douglas Caldwell and Joergen Christensen-Dalsgaard and William D. Cochran and Edna DeVore and Edward W. Dunham and Thomas N. Gautier and John C. Geary and Ronald L. Gilliland and Alan Gould and Jon Jenkins and Yoji Kondo and David W. Latham and Jack J. Lissauer and Geoffrey Marcy and David Monet and Dimitar Sasselov and Alan Boss and Donald Brownlee and John Caldwell and Andrea K. Dupree and Steve B. Howell and Hans Kjeldsen and Soeren Meibom and David Morrison and Tobias Owen and Harold Reitsema and Jill Tarter and Stephen T. Bryson and Jessie L. Dotson and Paul Gazis and Michael R. Haas and Jeffrey Kolodziejczak and Jason F. Rowe and Jeffrey E. Van Cleve and Christopher Allen and Hema Chandrasekaran and Bruce D. Clarke and Jie Li and Elisa V. Quintana and Peter Tenenbaum and Joseph D. Twicken and Hayley Wu},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1001.0268},
year = {2015}
}
Comments
16 pages, 5 figures, 1 table 26 Jan revision replaced Subject headings with keywords from approved list