Kepler Results

Kepler completed another science data download over October 18-19.

It is expected that confirmation of a number of planets will be announced by NASA in conjunction with the January 2010 American Astronomical Society (AAS) meeting in Washington DC.

Systematic noise results from the imperfect nature of any measuring device. It represents the instrument’s “finger print” placed upon the measurement, and must be calibrated out of the data in post-processing on the ground. Because systematic noise depends on the specific characteristics of the instrument, the best calibration requires that the noise sources be characterized and modeled based on measurements made in space. The Kepler team has been developing the ground software to calibrate out the various systematic noise sources since launch, and this work will continue for a number of months. As each source of systematic noise is calibrated, fainter transit signals can be detected. Data collected from the spacecraft will be continually reprocessed as the ground software matures, revealing smaller and smaller planets. This is a normal process and has been part of the Kepler plan since before launch. Fortunately for Kepler, the worst sources of systematic noise affect only a small portion of the field of view, so the majority of the field of view will be calibrated earlier, enabling small planets to be detected sooner.

While operations of the Kepler spacecraft continue, the Kepler Science Team is preparing for the January AAS meeting a number of papers and presentations on Kepler and its early results. Also in January, special issues of both Science Magazine and the Astrophysical Journal will publish 3 overview papers in the former and several papers discussing technical aspects of the Mission in the latter journal. As the AAS draws closer, the Kepler project is delighted to report that some of Kepler’s data is closer to being made public. Data collected by the Kepler Mission during commissioning, and during the first six weeks of the science operations, have now been processed and sent to the archive at the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore, MD. From there the data will be available to the Science Team members for their continued investigations. This early data will be released to the public in June 2010.
Note: MAST is already publicizing the release of the dropped target data and it is possible to download light curves (as of Nov 4).

However ground-based follow up observations confirm the discovery of
exoplanets with sizes ranging from 0.6 Rj to1.5Rj and orbital periods
ranging from 3 to 9 days