Related papers: Locating Planets in Sky Using Manual Calculations
Over the course of 3.1 years we determined the position of Mars on 75 dates using a handheld cross staff and two to five bright reference stars of known right ascension and declination on each occasion. On average the observed positions of…
No circumbinary planets have been discovered smaller than 3 Earth radii, yet planets of this small size comprise over 75% of the discoveries around single stars. The observations do not prove the non-existence of small circumbinary planets,…
Co-orbital planets have not yet been discovered, although they constitute a frequent by-product of planetary formation and evolution models. This lack may be due to observational biases, since the main detection methods are unable to spot…
We use seven year's worth of observations from the Catalina Sky Survey and the Siding Spring Survey covering most of the northern and southern hemisphere at galactic latitudes higher than 20 degrees to search for serendipitously imaged…
This tutorial covers the use of absolute astrometry, in particular from the combination of the Hipparcos and Gaia missions, to identify faint companions to nearby stars and to measure the masses and orbits of those companions. Absolute…
In this paper, we use a sixth order Legendre series expansion to approximate the mean annual insolation by latitude of a planet with obliquity angle $\beta$, leading to faster computations with little loss in the accuracy of results. We…
The process of identifying stars is integral toward stellar based orientation determination in spacecraft. Star identification involves matching points in an image of the sky with stars in an astronomical catalog. A unified framework for…
Stellar occultations have been used to search for Kuiper Belt and Oort Cloud objects. We propose a search for interstellar objects based on the characteristic durations ($\sim 0.1 \mathrm{s}$) of their stellar occultation signals and high…
Direct imaging of exoplanetary systems is a powerful technique that can reveal Jupiter-like planets in wide orbits, can enable detailed characterization of planetary atmospheres, and is a key step towards imaging Earth-like planets. Imaging…
Gravitational microlensing is a new technique that allows low-mass exoplanets to be detected at large distances of ~7kpc. This paper briefly outlines the principles of the method and describes the observational techniques. It shows that…
The successful prediction of lensing events is a new and exciting enterprise that provides opportunities to discover and study planetary systems. The companion paper investigates the underlying theory. This paper is devoted to outlining the…
In a Universe with a detectable nontrivial spatial topology the last scattering surface contains pairs of matching circles with the same distribution of temperature fluctuations --- the so-called circles-in-the-sky. Searches undertaken for…
Orbit determination of spacecraft in orbit has been mostly dependent on either GNSS satellite signals or ground station telemetry. Both methods present their limitations, however: GNSS signals can only be used effectively in earth orbit,…
Halometry---mapping out the spectrum, location, and kinematics of nonluminous structures inside the Galactic halo---can be realized via variable weak gravitational lensing of the apparent motions of stars and other luminous background…
The probability of detecting a planetary companion of a lensing star during a microlensing event toward the Galactic center, averaged over all relevant event and galactic parameters, when the planet-star mass ratio $q=0.001$ has a maximum…
Long range observations in the field of astronomy have opened up our understanding of the Solar System, the Galaxy and the wider Universe. In this paper we discuss the idea of direct in-situ reconnaissance of nearby stellar systems, using…
In order to avoid collisions with space debris, the near Earth orbit must be continuously scanned by either ground- or spaced-based facilities. For the low Earth orbit, radar telescopes are the workhorse for this task, especially due to…
A method is developed to calculate collision probability in this paper. Based on the encounter geometric features of space objects, it is reasonable to separate the radial orbital motions from that in the cross section for most encounter…
An effective method for detailed observation of the Solar System planets is the use of vehicles that can perform flight in their atmospheres, with the most promising of them being Flyers (aircraft for other planets atmospheres). Besides the…
The distribution of instellation at the top of a planet's atmosphere or surface is usually calculated using the inverse-square law of radiation. This is based on the assumption that the host star is far enough to be considered a point-sized…