Related papers: Discovering Numerous Interstellar Objects with A D…
Multi-wavelength spectroscopy can be used to constrain the dust and gas properties in debris disks. Circumstellar dust absorbs and scatters incident stellar light. The scattered light is sometimes resolved spatially at visual and…
Physical characterization of Trans-Neptunian objects, a primitive population of the outer solar system, may provide constraints on their formation and evolution. The goal of this work is to characterize a set of 15 scattered disk (SDOs) and…
For microlensing case angular distances between images or typical astrometric shifts due to microlensing are about $10^{-5}-10^{-6} \mu as$. Such an angular resolution will be reached with the space space--ground interferometer Radioastron.…
Measurements by dust detectors on interplanetary spacecraft appear to indicate a substantial flux of interstellar particles with masses exceeding 10^{-12}gram. The reported abundance of these massive grains cannot be typical of interstellar…
The detection of lower mass planets now being reported via radial velocity and microlensing surveys suggests that they may be ubiquitous. If missions such as Kepler are able to confirm this, the detection and study of rocky planets via…
The overarching goal of planetary astronomy is to deduce how the present collection of objects found in our Solar System were formed from the original material present in the proto-solar nebula. As over two hundred exo-planetary systems are…
We derive Galactic continuum spectra from 5-96/cm from COBE/FIRAS observations. The spectra are dominated by warm dust emission, which may be fit with a single temperature in the range 16-21 K (for nu^2 emissivity) along each line of sight.…
Isolated ideal neutron stars (NS) of age $>10^9$ yrs exhaust thermal and rotational energies and cool down to temperatures below $\mathcal{O}(100)$ K. Accretion of particle dark matter (DM) by such NS can heat them up through kinetic and…
The quest for other habitable worlds and the search for life among them are major goals of modern astronomy. One way to make progress towards these goals is to obtain high-quality spectra of a large number of exoplanets over a broad range…
Since in situ studies and interplanetary dust collections only provide a spatially limited amount of information about the interplanetary dust properties, it is of major importance to complete these studies with properties inferred from…
Precision infrared photometry from Spitzer has enabled the first direct studies of light from extrasolar planets, via observations at secondary eclipse in transiting systems. Current Spitzer results include the first longitudinal…
This paper investigates whether an isotropic zodiacal light from the outer Solar system can account for the detected background excess in near-infrared. Assuming that interplanetary dust particles are distributed in a thin spherical shell…
The very inner structure of massive YSOs is difficult to trace. With conventional observational methods we often identify structures still several hundreds of AU in size. But we also need information about the innermost regions where the…
Detections of massive extrasolar moons are shown feasible with the Kepler space telescope. Kepler's findings of about 50 exoplanets in the stellar habitable zone naturally make us wonder about the habitability of their hypothetical moons.…
To explore capabilities of moderate-size optical telescopes in surveys, the set of 9 new wide-field designs having apertures up to 1 m is considered. All but one systems have angular field of view in a range 3.5-10 degrees and flat focal…
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 properties of dust in the interstellar medium (ISM) nearest the Sun are poorly understood because the low column densities of dust toward nearby stars induce little photometric reddening, rendering the grains largely undetectable.…
We present spectroscopic and interferometric measurements for a sample of nine K giant stars. These targets are of particular interest because they are slated for stellar oscillation observations. Our improved parameters will directly…
Radio wavelength observations of solar system bodies reveal unique information about them, as they probe to regions inaccessible by nearly all other remote sensing techniques and wavelengths. As such, the SKA will be an important telescope…
Water (H2O) ice is an important solid constituent of many astrophysical environments. To comprehend the role of such ices in the chemistry and evolution of dense molecular clouds and comets, it is necessary to understand the freeze-out,…