Lecture Description
09/16/2009
HST Imaging of Fomalhaut: Direct detection of an exosolar planet and Kuiper Belt around a nearby star
Paul Kalas, SETI Institute and University of California, Berkeley
Advances in high-contrast imaging have produced a new sample of spatially resolved debris disks with morphologies attributed to the dynamical effects of planets. I will briefly review several cases, including our recent non-detection of Beta Pictoris b using Keck adaptive optics at L-prime. Then I will focus on the case for a planetary system around the nearby A star Fomalhaut. Optical coronagraphic observations using the Advanced Camera for Surveys aboard HST shows a vast dusty debris belt offset from the star and cleanly sculpted at its inside border. Follow-up HST images have further revealed a co-moving point source with apparent orbital motion 18 AU interior to the dust belt. I will discuss both the observational and theoretical evidence that the point source is a planet with < 3 Jupiter masses, making Fomalhaut b the lowest mass planet candidate detected via direct imaging. I will give alternate explanations and discuss future plans for the detailed mapping of Fomalhaut's planetary system.
Course Index
- David Morrison: Mission to a Potentially Threatening Asteroid
- Laura T. Iraci: Laboratory Studies of Water Ice Cloud formation under Martian Conditions
- Jeffrey Van Cleve: The Race to Detect the First Earth-sized Planet
- Ron Greeley: Surface modifications by winds on Earth, Mars, Venus, and Titan
- JoAnne Hewett: The Hunt for Hidden Dimensions
- Franck Marchis: Multiple Asteroid Systems: New Techniques to Study New Worlds
- Interstellar and Early Solar System Organics in Samples from Comet Wild 2
- Ross A. Beyer: Google Earth, now with Mars!
- Jeffrey Scargle: Tools for Probing the Universe
- Richard Muller: Discovery of Strong Cycles in Fossil Diversity
- Rachel Mastrapa: Weathering on Icy Satellites: Probing the Near Surface Using Infrared Spectroscopy
- John McCarthy: Convergent evolution of our own and extra-terrestrial intelligence
- Jasper Halekas: The Dynamic Lunar Environment
- Tom Abel: First Things in the Universe
- Julie Chittenden: Experimental determination of the effect of salts, regolith, and wind
- Philip Russell: Aerosol particle roles in climate change
- Edwin Kite: True Polar Wander and Climate on Late Hesperian/Amazonian Mars
- Robert Landis: NEOs Ho!! The Asteroid Option
- Terry Fong: Field Testing of Utility Robots for Lunar Surface Operations
- Mikhail Kreslavsky: Geological record of recent climate change on Mars
- Amos Nur: Apocolypse: Earthquakes, Archeology and the the Wrath of God
- Robert Lillis: Death of the Martian Dynamo
- Brian Jeffs: Progress in phased array feed development for radio astronomy
- Ray Kurzweil: The Implications of the Law of Accelerating Returns for the Search for ETI
- The impact and recovery of asteroid 2008 TC3
- Dr. Beth Ann Hockey: How to Speak to Your Computer
- Janice Bishop: The Surface of Mars
- John Balboni: How do You Qualify Heat Shields on Earth?
- Kevin Zahnle: Earth After the Moon-forming Impact
- Dave Brain: Atmospheric Escape and Aurora on Mars
- Michael Carr: Mars - The Water Story and Prospects for Life
- Risa Wechsler: Connecting Galaxies, Halos, and Star Formation Rates Across Cosmic Time
- Natalie Batalha: Kepler's First Peek
- Darlene Lim: Pavilion Lake - Diving Deep to Get Us to the Moon and Mars
- Paul Kalas: HST Imaging of Fomalhaut
- Reid Parsons: Where is Mars' Ice?
- Markus Aschwanden: Solar Flares and Coronal Mass Ejections Observed with STEREO
- Nathan Bramall: Detecting Organics Using Fluorescence Spectroscopy
- Dr. Stefan Funk: Fermi-LAT Observing the Universe With High-Energy Gamma-Ray Eyes
- Special Panel: LCROSS Mission - The First Results of the Impact
- Elmar Fuchs: The Inner Structure of a Floating Water Bridge
- Ben Zuckerman: The Search for Intelligent Life in the Universe - Some Great Challenges for SETI
- David Hollenbach: Water, Molecular Oxygen and Ice in Star-Forming Molecular Clouds
- Linda Spilker: The Rings of Saturn as seen by Cassini CIRS
- Claudio Maccone: Deep Space Flight and Communications
- Lauren Wye: Titan's Ontario Lacus
- Steven S. Vogt: Finding Planets Around Nearby Stars
- Gerry Harp: Exploring Alternative SETI Search Algorithms with the ATA
Course Description
The colloquiums are free and open to the public, and run from noon to 1 pm on Wednesdays at the SETI Institute, 515 N. Whisman Road, Mountain View, California.