Project support for the Wide Area Search for Planets
Lead Research Organisation:
Queen's University Belfast
Department Name: Sch of Mathematics and Physics
Abstract
Questions such as ``how many stars have planets around them?'' and ``how many habitable planets are there?'' interest both astronomers and everyone else. To answer them we need to find planets that can be studied in detail, seeking to understand the processes by which planets form and solar systems evolve. Of the two hundred planets that astronomers have found orbiting other stars we can learn most about those that transit in front of their star. We can measure how big they are, how heavy they are, and thus deduce their density and what they are made of. And by looking at how their atmosphere absorbs the light of their star we can discover the composition of their atmospheres. The WASP project aims to monitor 40 million of the brightest stars, looking for the tiny dips in their light caused by a planet passing in front of them. We will survey the sky for the transiting planets that are relatively close to Earth, which we can study in detail to enable us to understand how planetary systems form and evolve. The next generation of space missions, such as the James Webb Space Telescope, the successor to Hubble, will prioritize the study of planets around other stars. The WASP project will find the planets that will make the best and most interesting targets.
Organisations
Publications
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Cooke B
(2020)
Two Transiting Hot Jupiters from the WASP Survey: WASP-150b and WASP-176b
in The Astronomical Journal
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Collier Cameron A
(2009)
The main-sequence rotation???colour relation in the Coma Berenices open cluster
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
![publication icon](/resources/img/placeholder-60x60.png)
Cameron A
(2010)
Line-profile tomography of exoplanet transits - II. A gas-giant planet transiting a rapidly rotating A5 star? A gas-giant planet transiting an A5 star
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
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Butters O
(2010)
The first WASP public data release
in Astronomy and Astrophysics
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Brown D
(2012)
ANALYSIS OF SPIN-ORBIT ALIGNMENT IN THE WASP-32, WASP-38, AND HAT-P-27/WASP-40 SYSTEMS
in The Astrophysical Journal
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Bouchy F
(2010)
WASP-21b: a hot-Saturn exoplanet transiting a thick disc star
in Astronomy and Astrophysics
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Bentley S
(2009)
The masses and radii of HD 186753B and TYC7096-222-1B: the discovery of two M-dwarfs that eclipse A-type stars
in Astronomy & Astrophysics
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Barros S
(2010)
WASP-38b: a transiting exoplanet in an eccentric, 6.87d period orbit
in Astronomy & Astrophysics
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Barros S
(2011)
A lower mass for the exoplanet WASP-21b A lower mass for the exoplanet WASP-21b
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
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Anderson D
(2012)
WASP-44b, WASP-45b and WASP-46b: three short-period, transiting extrasolar planets WASP-44b, WASP-45b and WASP-46b
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
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Anderson D
(2011)
WASP-31b: a low-density planet transiting a metal-poor, late-F-type dwarf star
in Astronomy & Astrophysics
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Anderson D
(2011)
WASP-40b: Independent Discovery of the 0.6 M Jup Transiting Exoplanet HAT-P-27b
in Publications of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific
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Anderson D
(2010)
WASP-17b: AN ULTRA-LOW DENSITY PLANET IN A PROBABLE RETROGRADE ORBIT
in The Astrophysical Journal
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Anderson D
(2015)
THE WELL-ALIGNED ORBIT OF WASP-84b: EVIDENCE FOR DISK MIGRATION OF A HOT JUPITER
in The Astrophysical Journal
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Anderson D
(2015)
WASP-20b and WASP-28b: a hot Saturn and a hot Jupiter in near-aligned orbits around solar-type stars
in Astronomy & Astrophysics
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Anderson D
(2011)
WASP-30b: A 61 M Jup BROWN DWARF TRANSITING A V = 12, F8 STAR
in The Astrophysical Journal