Related papers: M31 Pixel Lensing PLAN Campaign: MACHO Lensing and…
There is abundant evidence that the mass of the Universe is dominated by dark matter of unknown form. The MACHO project is one of several teams searching for the dark matter around our Galaxy in the form of Massive Compact Halo Objects…
By means of extensive galactic modeling we study the implications of the more than 100 microlensing events that have now been observed for the composition of the dark halo of the Galaxy. Based on the currently published data, including the…
We report the discovery of a microlensing candidate projected 2'54" from the center of M32, on the side closest to M31. The blue color (R-I= 0.00 +/- 0.14) of the source argues strongly that it lies in the disk of M31, while the proximity…
The Angstrom Project is using a global network of 2m-class telescopes to conduct a high cadence pixel microlensing survey of the bulge of the Andromeda Galaxy (M31), with the primary aim of constraining its underlying bulge mass…
We study the possibility to detect extrasolar planets in M31 through pixel-lensing observations. Using a Monte Carlo approach, we select the physical parameters of the binary lens system, a star hosting a planet, and we calculate the…
PLANET (the Probing Lensing Anomalies NETwork) is a worldwide collaboration of astronomers whose primary goal is to monitor microlensing events densely and precisely in order to detect and study anomalies that contain information about…
Pixel lensing is gravitational microlensing of unresolved stars. The main target explored up to now has been the nearby galaxy of Andromeda, M31. The scientific issues of interest are the search for dark matter in form of compact halo…
The main aim of microlensing experiments is to evaluate the mean mass of massive compact halo objects (MACHOs) and the mass fraction of the Galactic halo made by this type of dark matter. Statistical analysis shows that by considering a…
After a decade of gravitational microlensing experiments, a dozen of microlensing candidates in the direction of the stars of the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) have been detected by the EROS and MACHO groups. Recently it was shown that the…
We propose to search for MACHOs by observing EAGLE (Extremely Amplified Gravitational LEnsing) events of a majority of dim stars. This search is independent of the usual one. For the detection limit of EAGLE (about 20 mag), about 100 f…
We present the lightcurves of 21 gravitational microlensing events from the first six years of the MACHO Project gravitational microlensing survey which are likely examples of lensing by binary systems. These events were manually selected…
Microlensing and pixel-lensing surveys play a fundamental role in the searches for galactic dark matter and in the study of the galactic structure. Recent observations suggest the presence of a population of old white dwarfs with high…
We describe the results and outline the methods used in a search for microlensing events affecting stars in the outer bulge and inner disk of M31, due both to masses in M31 and the Galaxy. These observations, from 1994 and 1995 on the…
The simplest interpretation of the microlensing events observed towards the Large Magellanic Clouds is that approximately half of the mass of the Milky Way halo is in the form of MAssive Compact Halo Objects with $M \sim 0.5 M_{\odot}$. It…
The historical microlensing surveys MACHO, EROS, MOA and OGLE (hereafter summarized in the MEMO acronym) have searched for microlensing toward the LMC for a total duration of 27 years. We have studied the potential of joining all databases…
Within 8 years, the current microlensing surveys of M31 will provide several hundred events affecting unresolved stars. They will thus allow a statistical study of the dark matter in M31's halo. The NGST will resolve these stars and…
An automated search is carried out for microlensing events using a catalogue of 44554 variable superpixel lightcurves derived from our three-year monitoring program of M31. Each step of our candidate selection is objective and reproducible…
By monitoring $10^6$ quasars one could search for lensing by stars and Massive Compact Halo Objects (Machos) out to redshifts $z\sim 4$. If Machos have a present cosmological density $\Omega_{L,0}=1\%$, then the expected event rate is…
Results are presented from the MACHO collaboration gravitational microlensing search. The experiment and the nearly 50 microlensing events that have been detected are described. Limits on the baryonic content of the halo are given, as are…
Microlensing experiments today have a tantalizing result; they have detected an excess of microlensing events beyond what is expected from known stellar populations. These events could be due to a possible form of Halo dark matter. However,…