Related papers: Linking the Solar System and Extrasolar Planetary …
White dwarf planetary science is a rapidly growing field of research featuring a diverse set of observations and theoretical explorations. Giant planets, minor planets, and debris discs have all been detected orbiting white dwarfs. The…
One of the most surprising discoveries of extrasolar planets is the detection of planets in moderately close binary star systems. The Jovian-type planets in the two binaries of Gamma Cephei and GJ 86 have brought to the forefront questions…
Planetary rings are the only nearby astrophysical disks, and the only disks that have been investigated by spacecraft. Although there are significant differences between rings and other disks, chiefly the large planet/ring mass ratio that…
The search for habitable conditions beyond Earth is a top priority in astrophysics. The discovery of habitable exoplanets beyond our solar system will require a suite of instruments providing long-term monitoring for detection (e.g. with…
Earth is the only planet known to harbor life and, as a result, the search for habitable and inhabited planets beyond the Solar System commonly focuses on analogs to our planet. However, Earth's atmosphere and surface environment have…
We investigate whether rings around extrasolar planets could be detected from those planets' transit lightcurves. To this end we develop a basic theoretical framework for calculating and interpreting the lightcurves of ringed planet…
Baseline generation for tracking applications is a difficult task when working with real world radar data. Data sparsity usually only allows an indirect way of estimating the original tracks as most objects' centers are not represented in…
The trajectory of an interplanetary spacecraft can be used to test gravitation in the Solar System. Its determination relies on radio tracking and is limited by the uncertainty on the spacecraft non-gravitational acceleration. The addition…
Exoplanets, or planets outside our own solar system, have long been of interest to astronomers; however, only in the past two decades have scientists had the technology to characterize and study planets so far away from us. With advanced…
Currently, over forty transiting planets have been discovered by ground-based photometric surveys, and space-based missions like Kepler and CoRoT are expected to detect hundreds more. Follow-up photometric observations from the ground will…
Having discovered that Earth-sized planets are common, we are now embarking on a journey to determine if Earth-like planets are also common. Finding Earth-like planets is one of the most compelling endeavors of the 21st century - leading us…
The next generation of high-contrast imaging instruments will provide the first unresolved image of an extrasolar planet. While the emitted infrared light from the planet in thermal equilibrium should show almost no phase effect, the…
In March 2009, NASA will launch the Kepler satellite -- a mission designed to discover habitable Earth-like planets around distant Sun-like stars. The method that Kepler will use to detect distant worlds will only reveal the size of the…
The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) will allow observations with a unique combination of spectral, spatial, and temporal resolution for the study of outer planet satellites within our Solar System. We highlight the infrared spectroscopy…
The relativity of Global Positioning System (GPS) pseudorange measurements is explored within the geometrical optics approximation in the curved space-time near Earth. A space-time grid for navigation is created by the discontinuities…
In this field report, we detail the lessons learned from our field expedition to collect Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR) data in a Mars analog environment for the purpose of validating GPR localization techniques in rugged environments.…
Radar is a critical tool for maintaining knowledge of the many ob-jects in low Earth orbit and thus for maintaining confidence that societies around the world are secure against a variety of space-based threats. It is therefore important to…
Measurements of a wide variety of aerial phenomena such as drones, birds, planes, and other aerial objects can in principle be obtained from open access radio detection and ranging equipment. Passive strategies involve existing cell towers…
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…
Event-based cameras (EBCs) are a promising new technology for star tracking-based attitude determination, but prior studies have struggled to determine accurate ground truth for real data. We analyze the accuracy of an EBC star tracking…