New Worlds

1
New Worlds
Julia DeMarines Webster Cash, Giada Arney, Phil
Oakley, Eric Schindhelm (University of
Colorado) And the New Worlds Team
(newworlds.colorado.edu)
Introduction New World Observer is a mission
designed to search for terrestrial exoplanets,
specifically planets that may harbor life. The
mission will consist of a 4 meter telescope and a
starshade 50 meters across (a 16 petal occulter)
that will be in orbit at L2 (Lagrange point 2).
The star shade will diffract light in such a
way that the light will deconstructively
interfere with itself allowing the faint light,
reflected off of the planets, to be imaged and
analyzed.
Method Once we have identified a target star
(one with planets in the habitable zone) we will
then take long exposures to be able to gather
enough light from the planet to analyze the data.
Spectroscopic analysis from the starlight,
reflected off the planets, will give insight on
the composition of the atmosphere. We have the
capability to detect as little as 2 oxygen in an
atmosphere, which means we can detect a planet in
the early stages of plant production!
16 petal starshade Courtesy of Northrop Grumman
Space Technology
Imaging exo-solar systems and planets The
starshade will reduce the stars light to enable
us to image its exo-solar system (see image to
the right) N.W.O. will be able to roughly map
continents and the oceans of exoplanets. This
is done by photometrically observing the most
interesting planets, over time, and seeing how
their light curves change (see graph below) This
is much like how we imaged the topography of
Pluto

• What we may discover
• New Worlds has the capability to detect molecular
  oxygen in the atmosphere.
• ?Detection of the O2 A band (761 nm) in the
  visible is a direct indication for having plant
  life.
• New Worlds will also be able to detect the H2O
  line at 960 nm.
• ?This indicates the presence of water, and
  possibly water worlds. Another place where life
  could exist.
• We will discover exo-solar systems with a wide
  variety of planet sizes
• This will help us to understand the formation of
  solar systems, and understand planetary migration
  better
• ? Shadow of a 16 petal
  
  mask, linear
  and log
  
  
  representation respectably
• We are looking for habitable
  planets much like Earth!?
  

?M
E?
?V
The telescope will fly into the shadow of a
target star, created by the starshade
This is what the image of Earth, Venus and Mars
would look like from 10 pc away with use of a
starshade. We truly live on a pale blue dot!
Mission Status Dr. Cash and his team are
working on simulating the following minimum
amount of molecular oxygen that can be detected,
minimum telescope diameter, minimum starshade
diameter. He is completing a 2 year study under
the NASA institute for Advanced Concepts and
proposing for future NASA support. Current
Parameters for NWO Telescope D 4m angular
resolution 0.026 spectral resolution 100
starshade separation 72,000km outer diameter
50m of petals 16 inner working angle
0.058 Substantial contributions have been made
by Northrop Grumman, Goddard Space Flight Center
and Ball Aerospace. ?Log graphs representing
sigma detection displaying mirror diameter and
resolution (respectively) vs. incrementing oxygen
content, with the current parameters.
Relevance to Astrobiology We have the potential
to observe biosignatures (such as the presence of
H20, O2) in the spectra of the planets
atmospheres This will infer whether or not the
planet has life or not We can learn much about
the formation of our solar system as well as
others and determine if our system is unique We
will discover many more terrestrial like planets
that could potentially harbor life.
H2O
O3
H2O
O2
O2
H2O
H2O
H2O
O2