Title: Before and After Exoplanets

Speaker: Professor Butler Paul  (The Earth and Planets Laboratory of Carnegie Institution)

Time: 14:00pm, July 5, 2024

Location: 2-208, PMO Xianlin Campus

Abstract: Modern science began with Copernicus speculating that the Earth is a planet and that all the planets orbit the Sun. Bruno followed up by speculating that the Sun is a star, that other stars have planets, and other planets are inhabited by life.  Astronomy and extrasolar planets were a really hot field at the time.

Over the past 30 years more than five thousand extrasolar planets have been found, first from ground-based precision Doppler and photometric transit surveys, and more recently by the Kepler and TESS space missions.  We have concentrated on building precise Doppler systems to survey the nearest stars.  Our systems at Lick, Keck, AAT, and Magellan have found hundreds of planets, including 5 of the first six planets, the first saturn-mass planet, the first neptune-mass planet, the first terrestrial mass planet, and the first multiple planet system.