Related papers: Star Watch Astrometry Probe
The Atmospheric Remote-sensing Infrared Exoplanet Large-survey (Ariel) is the first space mission dedicated to measuring the chemical composition and thermal structures of thousands of transiting exoplanets. Ariel was adopted in 2020 as the…
Abridged: The golden age of astrophysics is upon us with both grand discoveries (extra-solar planets, dark matter, dark energy) and precision cosmology. Fundamental understanding of the working of stars and galaxies is within reach, thanks…
We describe the optical alignment method for the Prime-focus Infrared Microlensing Experiment (PRIME) telescope which is a prime-focus near-infrared (NIR) telescope with a wide field of view for the microlensing planet survey toward the…
Cosmology with large interferometric telescopes is a rich and largely unexplored subject, involving three types of measurement: astrometric measurement of absolute distances and proper motions, dispersions of relative proper motions, and…
During some thirty years, 1980-2010, technical studies of optical interferometry from instruments in space were pursued as promising for higher spatial resolution and for higher astrometric accuracy. Nulling interferometry was studied for…
The accuracy of position measurements on stellar targets with the future Space Interferometry Mission (SIM) will be limited not only by photon noise and by the properties of the instrument (design, stability, etc.) and the overall…
The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) is optimized for observations in the near and mid infrared and will provide essential observations for targets that cannot be conducted from the ground or other missions during its lifetime. The state…
Intensity interferometry -- the correlation of spatially separated light intensities -- has historically been an important tool for precision optical astronomical observations. However, due to the extremely narrow field of view, its scope…
Visible-light long baseline interferometry holds the promise of advancing a number of important applications in fundamental astronomy, including the direct measurement of the angular diameters and oblateness of stars, and the direct…
High precision astrometry aims at source position determination to a very small fraction of the diffraction image size, in high SNR regime. One of the key limitations to such goal is the optical response variation of the telescope over a…
A space-based far-infrared interferometer could work synergistically with the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) and the Atacama Large Millimeter Array (ALMA) to revolutionize our understanding of the astrophysical processes leading to the…
The Planet Hunting and Asteroseismology Explorer Spectrophotometer, PHASES, is a concept for a space-borne instrument to obtain flux calibrated spectra and measure micro-magnitude photometric variations of nearby stars. The science drivers…
With the advent of optical interferometers that will be coming online in the next decade, radial velocity searches for extra-solar planets will be complemented by high angular resolution astrometric measurements. In this paper, we explore…
(abridged) A complete census of planetary systems around a volume-limited sample of solar-type stars (FGK dwarfs) in the Solar neighborhood with uniform sensitivity down to Earth-mass planets within their Habitable Zones out to several AUs…
The question "How did we get here and what will the future bring?" captures the human imagination and the attention of the National Academy of Science's Astronomy and Astrophysics Survey Commitee (AASC). Fulfillment of this "fundamental…
Using kilometric arrays of air Cherenkov telescopes, intensity interferometry may increase the spatial resolution in optical astronomy by an order of magnitude, enabling images of rapidly rotating stars with structures in their…
We have developed a low-cost off-the-shelf component star sensor (StarSense) for use in minisatellites and CubeSats to determine the attitude of a satellite in orbit. StarSense is an imaging camera with a limiting magnitude of 6.5, which…
Long-baseline interferometry at optical and near-infrared wavelengths is an emerging technology which is quickly becoming a useful tool to investigate stellar atmospheres and to compare observations with models. Stellar atmosphere models…
Ground based low frequency radio interferometers have been developed in the last decade and are providing the scientific community with high quality observations. Conversely, current radioastronomy instruments in space have a poor angular…
NASA's Kepler mission will fly a photometer based on a wide-field Schmidt camera with a 0.95 m aperture, staring at a single field continuously for at least 4 years. Although the mission's principal aim is to locate transiting extrasolar…