The Kepler Mission

[Spaceman Spiff]

For your intellectual enjoyment, and another example of the connections in science:
http://xxx.lanl.gov/abs/astro-ph/0210554

Kepler is designed primarily, as I understand it, to discover terrestrial type planets through their transits of the parent stars. However, all kinds of other nifty science in regards to other types of objects in orbit about normal stars will come out of this as well.

This is an exciting time to be an astronomer,
and I don't even work in these fields.

Enjoy.

[ToSeek]

ESA's Eddington to do likewise

[imported_Ziggy]

Due to launch in 2007, the Kepler Space Telescope will be one of the first ever telescopes able to detect Earth-like planets orbiting other stars. It will use the "transit" meathod to detect these planets indirectly. When a planet passes in front of it's host star, the star's brightness is lessend by a tiny bit. Kepler will be able to detect this change in brightness. The Kepler telescope will be so sensitive that it could detect planets of Earth-size or even smaller. The Kepler telescope will have to watch thounsands of stars at a time because the chances of seeing a transit around a single star are 1 in 200, plus, the transit must be observed three times to confirm it's a planet, in fact, Kepler will watch over 100,000 stars at a time, mostly sun-like G, K, and F class. After doing some searching, I found these estimates for Kepler's expected resaults on the Kepler home page. In a estimate, 50 terrestrial planets are observed with orbits close to 1 AU. 185 terrestrial planets are observed at having orbits around 1.3 AU. And a wopping, 640 terrestrial planets are observed at having orbits close to 2.2 AU. The estimates also found that the bulk of gas giant planets will be observed at having high-speed inner orbits like Mercury. Also, the estimates predicted that most star systems will have two Earth-sized planets or larger in their system between 0.5 and 1.5 AU ! I think I read the resaults wrong or something, go ahead and check yourself, Kepler Mission.

[DippyHippy]

Wow!!! I have to admit I haven't had a chance to look through it yet, but that sounds amazing. It also makes our little solar system sound positively abnormal!

This could be very exciting!!

[eburacum45]

No, it doesn't exactly imply that our system is abnormal, it just shows that planets in the innner part of the solar system are going to be more easily detected than those in the outer part.

Our solar system is probably quite normal for any system of a comparable age;

younger systems are more likely to have hot jupiters, and older systems will have fewer planets on average. This is because of the gradual increase in metallicity and dust in the nebulae from which stars are formed.

[Lomitus]

I gotta agree with eburacam...our solar system is probably quite normal. Scientists have been saying for years that our sun is quite "average" and sort of not so spectacular as far as suns go. I'd guess that as we explore more and learn more about other solar systems we will also probably find that our own solar system is probably the same...very average, humdrum and middle class.

It's always been man's arogance and some of the mis-beliefs that we've held over the years that creates the idea that "there must be something special about us, our planet and our solar system"...we want to believe we're "better then everybody else out there". It's kind of the same as the idea that every parent believes their kid is special and better then everyone else's kids. In a way some of that belief isn't totally unfounded...our Sun -is- special...-TO US-! It's what keeps us alive! Our planet -IS- special...it's where we came from and whats allowed us to evolve into the creatures we are today (and we really need to learn to take care of her much better then we do&#33! But I really think when you start compairing the Smith's with the Jone's on a Cosmic scale, we will probably find that over all our solar system is pretty hum-drum.

I look forward to the launch of the Kepler scope (I do wonder if it's going to have problems with geometric objects! LOL&#33 as well as the continued efforts of the currant space telescopes such as Hubble, Spitzer, etc.. There's just so much to see and do out there!

Bright Blessings & Gentle Breezes,
Jim

[ulgah]

Yes, our solar system is quite unique, if the information I gather is to be believed. I read, on the front page of the local newspaper, about two years ago that the scientists were puzzled not to find a solar system like ours, when they thought it to be so average or normal. At that time, they had found about 20 systems, all highly elliptical, with 2 or 3 larger than Jupiter size planets in close. That would wreck havoc with any small planets in the (our kind of life) zone. I realize, the closer in, large planets in highly elliptical orbits, would put more strain on the parent star, thus easier to locate via our methods. To the best of my knowledge, there has been about 110 systems detected at this point, and only one that has a circular solar system like ours. The rest are highly elliptical. The circular system is around "47 Ursae Majoris," which is about 50 LYs from us and in the vicinity of the big dipper. There may be a problem with it, also, as it is 2.5 billion years older than our sun. That puts it past prime time. Now, I'm not saying that there is no life out there, but the more I learn, the less likely it appears, to me, that there's intelligent life out there! (Nowhere close by.) Not close enough to communicate with, visit, or ever know they exist. The speed of light, the limiting factor. That is a physical law of this universe. (That may not be a law in some other universe!&#33 But let us keep the debate going, as I am still learning.

[ToSeek]

Kepler Mirror Arrives at Ball Aerospace for Test and Integration

The largest optical mirror ever built for a mission beyond Earth's orbit has arrived at Ball Aerospace & Technologies Corp. for environmental testing and spacecraft integration.

NASA's Kepler mission, with a field of view 70,000 times greater than
the Hubble Space Telescope, will attempt to detect Earth-like planets
orbiting stars beyond our solar system. By continuously monitoring the
brightness of more than 100,000 stars, Kepler will search for planets that
transit in front of stars. As a planet passes in front of its parent star,
Kepler will detect the star's brightness change to determine the planet's
size and orbit. The possible discovery of Earth-size planets in the
habitable zone of other stars will be the first step in determining the
extent of life in our galaxy.

Ball Aerospace is the prime contractor for the Kepler mission, managed
by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory for the NASA Ames Research Center. In
addition to the 0.95-meter photometer, Ball Aerospace is building the
spacecraft, and will perform system integration and testing. The 1.4-meter
primary mirror was produced by subcontractor L-3 Communications Brashear.

[ToSeek]

The Kepler Mission: The Search for Earth-like Planets

The hunt for Earth-like worlds orbiting distant suns will get a big boost next year with the liftoff of NASA’s Kepler mission. That spacecraft’s job is to monitor 100,000 stars in a stellar staring contest intended to detect periodic decreases in a star’s brightness—a falloff of light due to planets transiting their parent stars.

Kepler’s pursuit of rocky Earth-sized planets is a step forward in taking on some tough but major questions, such as: Are terrestrial planets common or rare? What are their sizes and distances?

[Launch window]

I think Kepler may discover a few hundred planets, I'm glad that with missions like Corot and Kepler exo-planet missions are finally being taken seriously

[ToSeek]

Kepler Team Cuts Costs, Avoids Cancellation

Threatened with cancellation, the team building NASA's Kepler planet-hunting telescope found a way get the spacecraft to the launch pad by early 2009 without a new infusion of cash.

Kepler consists of a single instrument, a 0.95-meter Schmidt telescope optimized for scanning a field of stars for signs of potentially habitable Earth-size planets. Integration of the spacecraft gets under way this summer, with the telescope due to be installed a year from now. A Delta 2 rocket is slated to launch Kepler into an Earth-trailing orbit.

The price tag for the Discovery-class mission has risen several times since its 2001 selection due to a combination of factors, including management problems, technical challenges and budget fluctuations beyond the project's control. In mid-2006, believing Kepler's problems were largely in the past, NASA accepted a 21-percent cost increase for construction of the telescope, pushing the total cost of the mission above $550 million. The launch date also slipped another five months past its original 2006 target to November 2008.

[Launch window]

the ny times mentions kepler

WASHINGTON — In Washington, it almost seems radical — completing government projects at their original budgeted cost.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/01/sc...ewanted=1&_r=1

A Kepler mirror inspection.


One project S. Alan Stern reined in was the Kepler mission to launch a planet-hunting telescope.

Yet at NASA, the new director of the space science division appears to be making headway at doing just that, creating some anguish among researchers and contractors along the way.

In his eight months on the job, the director, S. Alan Stern, has turned back almost a half-dozen requests for more money from projects experiencing cost overruns, he said. That has forced mission leaders to trim parts of their projects, streamline procedures or find other sources of financing.

Dr. Stern, an astrophysicist and planetary scientist, became associate administrator for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate in April. In an appearance before Congress the next month, he outlined a tough plan for keeping missions on budget and holding leaders responsible: better cost-estimating tools to more realistically price missions, more experience for scientists running projects, and new studies to better understand and reduce technology risks.

NASA devotes about $5.4 billion a year to its science program, divided among specialties like astrophysics, earth science and planetary exploration. To finance President Bush’s exploration initiative to return humans to the Moon, while also financing space shuttle operations and a shuttle replacement out of the agency’s approximately $16 billion annual budget, science program money is being held to about a 1 percent increase per year for four years.

Factoring in inflation and the loss of what had been anticipated financing increases, space experts say this amounts to a loss for NASA science of about $3 billion over that period. For Dr. Stern, that means doing more with less.

One of the first targets in his effort to attack cost overruns was the Kepler mission, a project started in 2001 to launch a planet-hunting telescope. Because of management problems, technical issues and other difficulties, the price tag went up and the launching date slipped from the original 2006 target.

In 2006, NASA resolved itself to a 20 percent cost overrun, which raised the price to $550 million, and accepted a 2008 launching time. Then the Kepler team came to Dr. Stern last spring with a request for an additional $42 million.

“Four times they came for more money and four times we told them ‘no,’” Dr. Stern said.

After Dr. Stern’s team threatened to open the project to new bids so other researchers could take it over using the equipment that had already been built, the Kepler group came up with a solution. Among other measures, the duration of the four-year mission was cut by six months and preflight testing was scaled back.

“When they came to believe I was serious and had my boss’s backing,” Dr. Stern said, “they took it seriously. They quickly found a way to erase that bill.”

Dr. Stern, 50, came to NASA from the Southwest Research Institute in Boulder, Colo., where he directed the Space Science and Engineering Division. His hard line on cost overruns has been one of the first signs of change noticed by researchers and many outsiders. So far, he said, his team has rolled back cost overruns in almost a half-dozen projects, sending out word that this is now standard procedure.

“I admire what he’s doing,” said Dr. Lennard A. Fisk, professor of space science at the University of Michigan and chairman of the Space Studies Board at the National Academy of Sciences. Dr. Fisk, who headed NASA’s science directorate in the 1980s, said true reform required a cultural change at the agency in how it runs programs. And a director must be consistent, he said, to convince people of the seriousness of the effort.

“In the beginning, he has to be hard-nosed with everybody,” Dr. Fisk said. “The first one he blinks on could be a problem. He has to maintain his credibility.”

Dr. Stern said that when he took the job, he told the NASA administrator, Michael D. Griffin, that he planned personnel and policy changes in his division to make the most of a stagnant budget while continuing to sponsor world-leading space science. He noted the appointment of Dr. John C. Mather, a Nobel laureate, to the vacant post of chief scientist in the directorate as a sign that science, not just launching spacecraft, would be the chief focus.

“We’re just not walking around swinging the ax,” Dr. Stern said. “We have a very new team that, I hope, is changing the way we do business.”

[matthewota]

Part of the funding issues come from the fact that earlier in the program it had to many different organizations managing it.

Now that management is consolidated, and the spacecraft is reconfigured, I am certain that it will eventually be launched.

I have a particular interest in this mission as it is the first spacecraft using a Schmidt telescope optical design, which was pioneered at Palomar Observatory with the 18 inch and Oschin telescopes there.

The basic operating principle of the occultation imager is easy to grasp too, as it is similar in many respects to amateur astroimaging.

[01101001]

NASA Launch Schedule

Date: April 10 [2009]
Mission: Kepler
Launch Vehicle: United Launch Alliance Delta II
Launch Site: Cape Canaveral Air Force Station - Launch Complex 17 - Pad 17-B
Description: The Kepler Mission, a NASA Discovery mission, is specifically designed to survey our region of the Milky Way galaxy to detect and characterize hundreds of Earth-size and smaller planets in or near the habitable zone.

Other NASA sources (like NASA Kepler Mission Profile) list launch target as 2009 February 16, or thereabouts.

I dug up some of these links for a Q&A Kepler-status article in topic keplar mission. They should be archived here.

NASA Kepler Mission
NASA Kepler Mission News
NASA Kepler Mission: About
NASA Discovery Mission: Kepler
NASA JPL PlanetQuest: Kepler
NASA Kepler Mission Twitter
NASA Launch Schedule
Wikipedia: Kepler Mission
Ball Aerospace: Kepler Mission
University of Colorado: Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics
SETI Institute: The Kepler Mission: Looking for Earth-sized Worlds
NASA TV (or NASA TV Yahoo! source or high-resolution)

[Launch window]

How rare is Earth?

[01101001]

JPL News: NASA's Kepler Spacecraft Ready to Ship to Florida

Engineers are getting ready to pack NASA's Kepler spacecraft into a container and ship it off to its launch site at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Fla.

The mission, scheduled to launch on March 5, will seek to answer an age-old question -- are there other Earths in space?

"Kepler is ready to begin its journey to its launch site, and ultimately to space, where it will answer a question that has been pondered by humankind at least as long ago as the ancient Greeks," said James Fanson, the project manager for the mission at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.

[KaiYeves]

Here we go!

[Romanus]

IMO, Kepler is the most interesting mission going up in the next five years. Then again, I'm exoplanet biased.

[NEOWatcher]

It's interesting that I have problems with the JPL quote, but like the wording from the reporter better (usually, I have the opposite gripe)

...where it will answer a question...

Will it? I have a hunch it will, but is it fair to state it as an absolute?

[Swift]

I'm sure it will answer a question, even if the question is "Is this the right way to look for Earth-like planets?" and the answer is "No".

[Launch window]

NASA will hold a media briefing on Thursday, Feb. 19 at 10 a.m. Pacific Time (1 p.m. Eastern Time) to discuss the upcoming Kepler mission
http://www.spaceref.com/calendar/calendar.html?pid=5308

the first spacecraft with the ability to find Earth-size planets orbiting stars like our sun in a zone where liquid water could exist. The televised briefing will take place at NASA Headquarters, 300 E St. S.W., Washington.

Kepler is scheduled to launch March 5 from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Fla.

Los Angeles area media are invited to JPL to watch the briefing via satellite and ask questions. Media must RSVP in advance to JPL Media Relations at 818-354-5011. Valid media credentials are required; non-U.S. citizens must also bring passports. Reporters may also ask questions by telephone. To reserve a telephone line, contact J.D. Harrington by e-mail at j.d.harrington @ nasa.gov

Briefing participants include:

-- Jon Morse, NASA's Astrophysics Division Director, NASA Headquarters, Washington
-- William Borucki, Kepler Science Principal Investigator, NASA Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, Calif.
-- Jim Fanson, Kepler Project Manager, NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
-- Debra Fischer, Professor of Astronomy, San Francisco State University, Calif.

Kepler is a NASA Discovery mission. NASA's Ames Research Center is the home organization of the Science Principal Investigator and is responsible for the ground system development, mission operations and science data analysis. Kepler mission development is managed by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. Ball Aerospace & Technologies Corp., Boulder, Colo., is responsible for developing the Kepler flight system and supporting mission operations.

[ToSeek]

Kepler and the Odds

The Kepler launch is coming up on March 5, marking the first time we will have the ability to find a true Earth analogue around another star; i.e., a planet of about Earth’s mass in the habitable zone where water can exist in liquid form on the surface. Which is not to say that COROT may not come close, though Kepler’s enormous star-field (100,000 targets in the Cygnus-Lyra region) and incredibly sensitive camera — a 95-megapixel array of charged coupled devices (CCDs) — is optimized for planets down to Earth size rather than larger ’super-Earths.’

[01101001]

It's getting close.

NASA Kepler Mission

LAUNCH INFORMATION
Launch date/time: 2009 March 5 at 10:48 pm EST

Launch target:

2009 March 5, 1948 PST, Thursday
2009 March 5, 2248 EST, Thursday
2009 March 6, 0348 UTC, Friday

8 days to launch

(USA Daylight Time begins 2009 March 8.)

[01101001]

Slipped a day, for review and analysis of hardware in common with recent Orbiting Carbon Observatory (OCO) failure.

NASA Launch Schedule

Date: March 6 [no earlier than]
Launch Windows: 10:49 - 10:52 p.m. and 11:13 - 11:16 p.m. EST

Tentative launch target:

2009 March 6, 1949 PST, Friday
2009 March 6, 2249 EST, Friday
2009 March 7, 0349 UTC, Saturday

8 days (and 30 minutes) to launch

[schlaugh]

A nice read and primer on Kepler, due to launch Friday evening.

In a Lonely Cosmos, a Hunt for Worlds Like Ours
By DENNIS OVERBYE
Published: March 2, 2009
Someday it might be said that this was the beginning of the end of cosmic loneliness.
Presently perched on a Delta 2 rocket at Cape Canaveral is a one-ton spacecraft called Kepler. If all goes well, the rocket will lift off about 10:50 Friday evening on a journey that will eventually propel Kepler into orbit around the Sun. There the spacecraft’s mission will be to discover Earth-like planets in Earth-like places — that is to say, in the not-too-cold, not-too-hot, Goldilocks zones around stars where liquid water can exist.
The job, in short, is to find places where life as we know it is possible.
“It’s not E.T., but it’s E.T.’s home,” said William Borucki, an astronomer at NASA’s Ames Research Center at Moffett Field in California, who is the lead scientist on the project.

[Horror Vacui]

I'm super psyched for this.


Help me spin the Earth faster so Friday gets here sooner!

[01101001]

San Jose Mercury: Mountain View scientists giddy over NASA's search for faraway planets

For at least the next 3-1/2 years, Silicon Valley will become a leading center for the search for extraterrestrial life.

The $591 million Kepler mission, with its science work directed from NASA Ames Research Center at Moffett Field, is NASA's first mission capable of finding Earthlike planets orbiting around other stars. [...]

While the first indications of newly discovered planets should be announced before the end of this year, they will be gas giants with short orbital periods close to their stars — and therefore not candidates to harbor life.

It will be three years, enough time for Kepler to observe three planetary transits and for ground-based telescopes to confirm the find, before NASA is able to announce the discovery of other Earthlike planets — or their absence.

[01101001]

Tentative launch target:

2009 March 6, 1949 PST, Friday
2009 March 6, 2249 EST, Friday
2009 March 7, 0349 UTC, Saturday

4 days to launch

[WazzuNYC]

"Scientists are giddy". Classic!!

[HypothesisTesting]

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/03/science/03kepl.html

"But the results will be profound either way. If Kepler doesn’t come through, that means Earth is really rare and we might be the only extant life in the universe and our loneliness is just beginning". “It would mean there might not be ‘Star Trek,’ ” Dr. Borucki said during a recent news conference.

This is a pessimistic assessment of the situation. Almost certain, there are billions of earth-like planets in Milky Way Galaxy, so they are just playing it conservative, with the 3 years before announcing results. But no doubt they'll find thousands in Kepler's field of view. BTW: if this is a half billion project, the USA taxpayers are paying, so I think they are entitled to weekly updates over the next 3 years; there shouldn't be any playing it close to the vest allowed . This is not a private company.

What is really debatable is what the Terrestrial Planet Finder will detect in the atmospheres in 2015. Chances are, they'll detect some planets with signature molecules of life in their atmospheres.