Bibcode
Dominik, Martin; Mackay, Craig; Steele, Iain; Snodgrass, Colin; Hirsch, Michael; Gråe Jørgensen, Uffe; Hundertmark, Markus; Rebolo, R.; Horne, Keith; Bridle, Sarah; Sicardy, Bruno; Bramich, Daniel; Alsubai, Khalid
Referencia bibliográfica
American Astronomical Society, ESS meeting #3, #106.02. BAAS volume 47 #6, November 2015.
Fecha de publicación:
12
2015
Número de citas
0
Número de citas referidas
0
Descripción
The image blurring by the Earth's atmosphere generally poses a
substantial limitation to ground-based observations. While opportunities
in space are scarce, lucky imaging can correct over a much larger patch
of sky and with much fainter reference stars. We propose the first of a
new kind of versatile instruments, "GravityCam", composed of ~100
EMCCDs, that will open up two entirely new windows to ground-based
astronomy: (1) wide-field high-resolution imaging, and (2) wide-field
high-speed photometry. Potential applications include (a) a
gravitational microlensing survey going 4 magnitudes deeper than current
efforts, and thereby gaining a factor 100 in mass at the same
sensitivity, which means probing down to Lunar mass or even below, (b)
extra-solar planet hunting via transits in galactic bulge fields, with
high time resolution well-suited for transit timing variation studies,
(c) variable stars in crowded fields, with sensitivity to very short
periods, (d) asteroseismology with many bright stars in one pointing,
(e) serendipitous occultations of stars by small solar system bodies,
giving access to the small end of the Kuiper Belt size distribution and
potentially leading to the first detection of true Oort cloud objects,
while predicted occultations at high time resolution can reveal
atmospheres, satellites, or rings, (f) general data mining of the
high-speed variable sky (down to 40 ms cadence).