Related papers: Pixel and Micro-lensing with NGST
One of the possible astrophysical solutions to the galactic dark matter problem is the presence of a significant amount of ``dark'' compact objects (MACHOs) in galactic dark matter halos. MEGA (Microlensing Exploration of the Galaxy and…
The status of the microlensing search for galactic dark matter in the form of massive astronomical compact halo objects (machos) is reviewed. Unresolved issues are discussed, as well as possible ways to solve these.
The position of the giant elliptical galaxy M87 at the center of the Virgo Cluster means that the inferred column density of dark matter associated with both the cluster halo and the galaxy halo is quite large. This system is thus an…
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…
Dark matter is an important ingredient of galaxies, as was recognised early on by Ken Freeman himself! Evidence for dark matter halos is still indirect, based on analysing motions of tracers such as gas and stars. In a sense the visible…
Until now, the detailed interpretation of the observed microlensing events has suffered from the fact that the physical parameters of the phenomenon cannot be uniquely determined from the available astronomical measurements, i.e. the…
The French collaboration EROS and the American-Australian collaboration MACHO have reported the observation of altogether $\sim$ 10 microlensing events by monitoring during several years the brightness of millions of stars in the Large…
Massive stars play a fundamental role in shaping the evolution of galaxies through feedback, chemical enrichment, and their end products as neutron stars and black holes. Despite major progress in the last decade, key uncertainties remain…
We apply the pixel method of analysis (sometimes called ``pixel lensing'') to a small subset of the EROS-1 microlensing observations of the bar of the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC). The pixel method is designed to find microlensing events of…
We show that exoplanets in the M31 galaxy may be detected with the pixel-lensing method by using telescopes making high cadence observations of an ongoing microlensing event. Although the mean mass for detectable exoplanets is about $2…
It is widely believed that dark matter exists within galaxies and clusters of galaxies. Under the assumption that this dark matter is composed of the lightest, stable supersymmetric particle, assumed to be the neutralino, the feasibility of…
Luminous stars in background galaxies straddling the lensing caustic of a foreground galaxy cluster can be individually detected due to extreme magnification factors of $\sim 10^2$--$10^3$, as recently observed in deep HST images. We…
Stellar microlensing is a powerful method to constrain compact dark matter models, uncover binary stars, and exoplanets during caustic crossing events. At cosmological distances, {\it James-Webb Space Telescope} ({\it JWST}) is routinely…
Microlensing is now a very popular observational astronomical technique. The investigations accessible through this effect range from the dark matter problem to the search for extra-solar planets. In this review, the techniques to search…
Gravitational lensing has now become a popular tool to measure the mass distribution of structures in the Universe on various scales. Here we focus on the study of galaxy's scale dark matter halos with galaxy-galaxy lensing techniques:…
We investigate gravitational microlensing signals produced by a spatially extended object transiting in front of a finite-sized source star. The most interesting features arise for lens and source sizes comparable to the Einstein radius of…
Microlensing of stars places significant constraints on sub-planetary-mass compact objects, including primordial black holes, as dark matter candidates. As the lens' Einstein radius in the source plane becomes comparable to the size of the…
Over the past decade, microlensing has developed into a powerful tool to study stellar astrophysics, especially stellar atmospheres, stellar masses, and binarity. I review this progress. Stellar atmospheres can be probed whenever the source…
Images from the next generation of telescopes will enable strikingly detailed reconstruction of the dark matter distributions in galaxy cluster cores using strong gravitational lensing analysis. This will provide a key test of Lambda-CDM…
Strong gravitational lensing offers a unique probe of dark matter (DM) on sub-galactic scales, where the abundance and distribution of low-mass halos are highly sensitive to the underlying properties of DM particles. In this work, we…