Related papers: Self-Microlensing in Compact Binary Systems
The population of solitary compact objects in the Galaxy is very diffcult to investigate. In this paper we analyze the possibility of using microlensing searches to detect and to analyze the properties of the solitary black holes and…
Massive objects located between Earth and a compact binary merger can act as a magnifying glass improving the sensitivity of gravitational wave detectors to distant events. Depending on the parameters of the system, a point mass lens…
This project examines the feasibility of using gravitational lensing to measure the mass of compact objects in eclipsing X-ray binary (XRB) systems. We investigate which kind of XRB would be most conducive for viewing the effect, by…
The possibility that a fraction of the dark matter is comprised of massive compact halo objects (MACHOs) remains unclear, especially in the 20-100 $M_{\odot}$ window. MACHOs could make up binaries, whose mergers may be detected by LIGO as…
We use the framework of microlensing to show that observations of binary systems, such as those made by {\it Gaia}, combined with follow-up weak lensing measurements, can provide a means to probe halos of exotic matter, possibly clumped…
The microlens parallax is a crucial observable for conclusively identifying the nature of lens systems in microlensing events containing or composed of faint (even dark) astronomical objects such as planets, neutron stars, brown dwarfs, and…
Over 40% of Sun-like stars are bound in binary or multistar systems. Stellar remnants in edge-on binary systems can gravitationally magnify their companions, as predicted 40 years ago. By using data from the Kepler spacecraft, we report the…
We propose a near-infrared microlensing survey of the central 2 degree field of the Galactic Center, in an attempt to estimate the surface density and mass distribution of distant free-floating brown dwarfs in the bulge and in the disk,…
The effect of stars on the lensing properties of the supermassive black hole in the Galactic Center is similar to the effect of planets on microlensing by a star. We show that the dense stellar cluster around SgrA* increases by factors of a…
The masses of compact objects like white dwarfs, neutron stars and black holes are fundamental to astrophysics, but very difficult to measure. We present the results of an analysis of subluminous B (sdB) stars in close binary systems with…
Microlensing and pixel-lensing surveys play a fundamental role in the searches for galactic dark matter and in the study of the galactic structure. Recent observations suggest the presence of a population of old white dwarfs with high…
Microlensing is generally studied in the geometric optics limit. However, diffraction may be important when nearby substellar objects lens occult distant stars. In particular the effects of diffraction become more important as the…
Massive black-hole (MBH) binaries, which are expected to form following the merger of their parent galaxies, produce gravitational waves which will be detectable by Pulsar Timing Arrays at nanohertz frequencies (year periods). While no…
We explore the usefulness of future gravitational microlensing surveys in the study of binary properties such as the binary fraction and the distributions of binary separation and mass ratio by using the binary sample detectable through a…
Despite astrophysical importance of binary star systems, detections are limited to those located in small ranges of separations, distances, and masses and thus it is necessary to use a variety of observational techniques for a complete view…
If the Dark Matter consists of primordial black holes (PBHs), we show that gravitational lensing of stars being monitored by NASA's Kepler search for extra-solar planets can cause significant numbers of detectable microlensing events. A…
A fraction of Galactic stars have compact companions which could be white dwarfs (WDs), neutron stars (NSs) or stellar-mass black holes (SBHs). In a detached and edge-on binary system including a main-sequence star and a compact object…
Distinguishing the photon output of an accreting supermassive black hole binary system from that of a single supermassive black hole accreting at the same rate is intrinsically difficult because the majority of the light emerges from near…
Microlensing observations have now become a useful tool in searching for non--luminous astrophysical compact objects (brown dwarfs, faint stars, neutron stars, black holes and even planets). Originally conceived for establishing whether the…
Although many models have been proposed, the physical mechanisms responsible for the formation of low-mass brown dwarfs are poorly understood. The multiplicity properties and minimum mass of the brown-dwarf mass function provide critical…