The PLATO 2.0 Mission
Abstract
PLATO 2.0 has recently been selected for ESA's M3 launch opportunity (2022/24). Providing accurate key planet parameters (radius, mass, density and age) in statistical numbers, it addresses fundamental questions such as: How do planetary systems form and evolve? Are there other systems with planets like ours, including potentially habitable planets? The PLATO 2.0 instrument consists of 34 small aperture telescopes (32 with 25 sec readout cadence and 2 with 2.5 sec candence) providing a wide field-of-view (2232 deg2) and a large photometric magnitude range (4-16 mag). It focusses on bright (4-11 mag) stars in wide fields to detect and characterize planets down to Earth-size by photometric transits, whose masses can then be determined by ground-based radial-velocity follow-up measurements. Asteroseismology will be performed for these bright stars to obtain highly accurate stellar parameters, including masses and ages. The combination of bright targets and asteroseismology results in high accuracy for the bulk planet parameters: 2%, 4-10% and 10% for planet radii, masses and ages, respectively. The planned baseline observing strategy includes two long pointings (2-3 years) to detect and bulk characterize planets reaching into the habitable zone (HZ) of solar-like stars and an additional step-and-stare phase to cover in total about 50% of the sky. PLATO 2.0 will observe up to 1,000,000 stars and detect and characterize hundreds of small planets, and thousands of planets in the Neptune to gas giant regime out to the HZ. It will therefore provide the first large-scale catalogue of bulk characterized planets with accurate radii, masses, mean densities and ages. This catalogue will include terrestrial planets at intermediate orbital distances, where surface temperatures are moderate. Coverage of this parameter range with statistical numbers of bulk characterized planets is unique to PLATO 2.0.
Cite
@article{arxiv.1310.0696,
title = {The PLATO 2.0 Mission},
author = {H. Rauer and C. Catala and C. Aerts and T. Appourchaux and W. Benz and A. Brandeker and J. Christensen-Dalsgaard and M. Deleuil and L. Gizon and M. -J. Goupil and M. Güdel and E. Janot-Pacheco and M. Mas-Hesse and I. Pagano and G. Piotto and D. Pollacco and N. C. Santos and A. Smith and J. -C. and Suárez and R. Szabó and S. Udry and V. Adibekyan and Y. Alibert and J. -M. Almenara and P. Amaro-Seoane and M. Ammler-von Eiff and M. Asplund and E. Antonello and W. Ball and S. Barnes and F. Baudin and K. Belkacem and M. Bergemann and G. Bihain and A. C. Birch and X. Bonfils and I. Boisse and A. S. Bonomo and F. Borsa and I. M. Brandão and E. Brocato and S. Brun and M. Burleigh and R. Burston and J. Cabrera and S. Cassisi and W. Chaplin and S. Charpinet and C. Chiappini and R. P. Church and Sz. Csizmadia and M. Cunha and M. Damasso and M. B. Davies and H. J. Deeg and R. F. DÍaz and S. Dreizler and C. Dreyer and P. Eggenberger and D. Ehrenreich and P. Eigmüller and A. Erikson and R. Farmer and S. Feltzing and F. de Oliveira Fialho and P. Figueira and T. Forveille and M. Fridlund and R. A. García and P. Giommi and G. Giuffrida and M. Godolt and J. Gomes da Silva and T. Granzer and J. L. Grenfell and A. Grotsch-Noels and E. Günther and C. A. Haswell and A. P. Hatzes and G. Hébrard and S. Hekker and R. Helled and K. Heng and J. M. Jenkins and A. Johansen and M. L. Khodachenko and K. G. Kislyakova and W. Kley and U. Kolb and N. Krivova and F. Kupka and H. Lammer and A. F. Lanza and Y. Lebreton and D. Magrin and P. Marcos-Arenal and P. M. Marrese and J. P. Marques and J. Martins and S. Mathis and S. Mathur and S. Messina and A. Miglio and J. Montalban and M. Montalto and M. J. P. F. G. Monteiro and H. Moradi and E. Moravveji and C. Mordasini and T. Morel and A. Mortier and V. Nascimbeni and R. P. Nelson and M. B. Nielsen and L. Noack and A. J. Norton and A. Ofir and M. Oshagh and R. -M. Ouazzani and P. Pápics and V. C. Parro and P. Petit and B. Plez and E. Poretti and A. Quirrenbach and R. Ragazzoni and G. Raimondo and M. Rainer and D. R. Reese and R. Redmer and S. Reffert and B. Rojas-Ayala and I. W. Roxburgh and S. Salmon and A. Santerne and J. Schneider and J. Schou and S. Schuh and H. Schunker and A. Silva-Valio and R. Silvotti and I. Skillen and I. Snellen and F. Sohl and S. G. Sousa and A. Sozzetti and D. Stello and K. G. Strassmeier and M. Švanda and Gy. M. Szabó and A. Tkachenko and D. Valencia and V. van Grootel and S. D. Vauclair and P. Ventura and F. W. Wagner and N. A. Walton and J. Weingrill and S. C. Werner and P. J. Wheatley and K. Zwintz},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1310.0696},
year = {2015}
}
Comments
63 pages, 17 figures, submitted to Experimental Astronomy (ExA)