Related papers: LMC Microlenses: Dark or Luminous?
We present a detailed study of the viewing angles of the LMC disk plane. We find that our viewing direction differs considerably from the commonly accepted values, which has important implications for the structure of the LMC. The…
We report on the identification of the lens responsible for microlensing event MACHO-LMC-20. As part of a \textit{Spitzer}/IRAC program conducting mid-infrared follow-up of the MACHO Large Magellanic Cloud microlensing fields, we discovered…
The recent discovery of microlensing of stars in the Large Magellanic Cloud has excited much interest in the nature of the lensing population. Detailed analyses indicate that the mass of these objects ranges from 0.3-0.8 solar masses,…
In recent years various models for the Galactic distribution of massive compact halo objects (MACHOs) have been proposed for the interpretation of microlensing toward the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC). A direct way to fit the best model is…
We present the detection of very extended stellar populations around the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) out to R~21 degrees, or ~18.5 kpc at the LMC distance of 50 kpc, as detected in the Survey of the MAgellanic Stellar History (SMASH)…
We analyse an N-body simulation of the Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC), that of Gardiner & Noguchi (1996) to determine its microlensing statistics. We find that the optical depth due to self-lensing in the simulation is low, 0.4 x 10^{-7}, but…
It has been revealed using microlensing that a considerable part, possibly more than half, of the dark matter in the halo of our Galaxy consists of objects with a mass spectrum ranging from 0.05 to 0.8 of the solar mass. What is the nature…
This paper reports the star count predictions of warped and flaring models of the outer Milky Way disk. These have been suggested as possible locations of the lenses responsible for the microlensing events towards the Large Magellanic Cloud…
It has been proposed that the MACHOs in our galaxy could be clumped in globular cluster--like associations or RAMBOs (robust associations of massive baryonic objects) (Moore \& Silk 1995). Here we investigate the effect such clustering has…
In the framework of the search of dark matter in galactic halos in form of massive compact halo object (MACHOs), we discuss the status of microlensing observations towards the Magellanic Clouds and the Andromeda galaxy, M31. The detection…
Microlensing studies of quasars can reveal dark matter lumps over a broad mass spectrum; we highlight the importance of monitoring quasars which are seen through the halos of low-redshift galaxies. For these configurations microlensing by…
The periphery of the Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC) can unlock important information regarding galaxy formation and evolution in interacting systems. Here, we present a detailed study of the extended stellar structure of the SMC using deep…
A galaxy cluster acts as a cosmic telescope over background galaxies but also as a cosmic microscope of the lens imperfections. The diverging magnification of lensing caustics enhances the microlensing effect of substructure present within…
Automatic classification of variability is now possible with tools like neural networks. Here, we present two neural networks for the identification of microlensing events -- the first discriminates against variable stars and the second…
The gravitational microlensing experiments in the direction of Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) predict a large amount of white dwarfs ($\sim 20%$) filling the galactic halo. However, the predicted white dwarfs have not been observed at the…
Microlensing events towards the Large Magellanic Cloud entail that a sizable fraction of dark matter is in the form of MACHOs (Massive Astrophysical Compact Halo Objects), presumably located in the halo of the Galaxy. Within the present…
The simplest interpretation of the microlensing events observed towards the Large Magellanic Clouds is that approximately half of the mass of the Milky Way halo is in the form of MAssive Compact Halo Objects with $M \sim 0.5 M_{\odot}$. It…
The MACHO Project monitors millions of stars in the Large Magellanic Cloud, the Small Magellanic Cloud and the bulge of the Milky Way searching for the gravitational microlensing signature of baryonic dark matter. This Project has yielded…
By means of extensive galactic modeling we study the implications of the more than eighty microlensing events that have now been observed for the composition of the dark halo of the Galaxy, as well as for other properties of the Galaxy. We…
The EROS-2 project was designed to test the hypothesis that massive compact halo objects (the so-called ``machos'') could be a major component of the dark matter halo of the Milky Way galaxy. To this end, EROS-2 monitored over 6.7 years…