A network of robotic telescopes called RoboNet-1.0 will soon join the hunt for Earth-like planets around other stars. RoboNet will look for the effects of gravitational micro-lensing, where distant light is bent around an unseen foreground object. A star whose light is undergoing such lensing would, if it had a planet, show a blip in its detected light which RoboNet should be able to follow-up. “The network,” says a press release from the Particle Physics and Astronomy Research Council, which funded the project, “stands the best chance of any existing facility of actually finding another Earth due to the large size of the telescopes, their excellent sites and sensitive instrumentation.”
The globally distributed RoboNet offers astronomers the chance to search anywhere in the sky without regard to local light conditions by passing observations from one telescope to the next. The Liverpool Telescope (Canary Islands), Faulkes North (Maui) and Faulkes South (New South Wales) telescopes make up the network. Software for RoboNet was developed by the Liverpool John Moores University eStar project.
Image: The Liverpool Telescope with its distinctive clamshell dome. Credit: Astrophysics Research Institute, Liverpool JMU
Says Dr Iain Steele of the eSTAR project:
“We have been able to use and develop new Grid technologies, which will eventually be the successor to the World Wide Web, to build a network of intelligent agents that can detect and respond to the rapidly changing universe much faster than any human. The agents act as “virtual astronomers” collecting, analysing and interpreting data 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, alerting their flesh-and-blood counterparts only when they make a discovery.”
Observations on demand are also critical for studying sudden changes in astronomical objects such as violent Gamma Ray Bursts, which can last from milliseconds to a few minutes before fading away to a long afterglow. Scientists hoping to track Gamma Ray Bursts (GRBs) would have to point their telescopes at the right point in the sky almost instantly to make useful observations. But NASA’s Swift satellite, to be launched in October, will help pinpoint the explosions of GRBs, relaying the coordinates of each burst to the RoboNet network within seconds.
The University of New South Wales Extrasolar Planet Search: a catalogue of variable stars from fields observed 2004–2007
Authors: J.L. Christiansen, A. Derekas, L.L. Kiss, M.C.B. Ashley, S.J. Curran, D.W. Hamacher, M.G. Hidas, M.R. Thompson, J.K. Webb, T.B. Young
(Submitted on 1 Feb 2008)
Abstract: We present a new catalogue of variable stars compiled from data taken for the University of New South Wales Extrasolar Planet Search. From 2004 October to 2007 May, 25 target fields were each observed for 1-4 months, resulting in ~87000 high precision light curves with 1600-4400 data points. We have extracted a total of 850 variable light curves, 659 of which do not have a counterpart in either the General Catalog of Variable Stars, the New Suspected Variables catalogue or the All Sky Automated Survey southern variable star catalogue.
The catalogue is detailed here, and includes 142 Algol-type eclipsing binaries, 23 beta Lyrae-type eclipsing binaries, 218 contact eclipsing binaries, 53 RR Lyrae stars, 26 Cepheid stars, 13 rotationally variable active stars, 153 uncategorised pulsating stars with periods less than 10 d, including delta Scuti stars, and 222 long period variableswith variability on timescales of greater than 10 d.
As a general application of variable stars discovered by extrasolar planet transit search projects, we discuss several astrophysical problems which could benefit from carefully selected samples of bright variables. These include: (i) the quest for contact binaries with the smallest mass ratio, which could be used to test theories of binary mergers; (ii) detached eclipsing binaries with pre-main-sequence components, which are important test objects for calibrating stellar evolutionary models; and (iii) RR Lyrae-type pulsating stars exhibiting the Blazhko-effect, which is one of the last great mysteries of pulsating star research.
Comments: 14 pages, 8 figures, 6 tables, accepted for publication in MNRAS
Subjects: Astrophysics (astro-ph)
Cite as: arXiv:0802.0096v1 [astro-ph]
Submission history
From: Laszlo L. Kiss [view email]
[v1] Fri, 1 Feb 2008 10:58:34 GMT (643kb)
http://arxiv.org/abs/0802.0096