Monitoring the high-energy radiation environment of exoplanets around low-mass stars with SPARCS (Star-Planet Activity Research CubeSat)

Paul A. Scowen; Evgenya L. Shkolnik; David Ardila; Travis Berman; Matthew Beasley; Judd Bowman; Michael Fitzgerald; Varoujan Gorjian; Daniel C. Jacobs; April Jewell; Joe Llama; Victoria Meadows; Shouleh Nikzad; Constance Spittler; Mark Swain; Robert Zellem

doi:10.1117/12.2315543

6 July 2018 Monitoring the high-energy radiation environment of exoplanets around low-mass stars with SPARCS (Star-Planet Activity Research CubeSat)

Paul A. Scowen, Evgenya L. Shkolnik, David Ardila, Travis Berman, Matthew Beasley, Judd Bowman, Michael Fitzgerald, Varoujan Gorjian, Daniel C. Jacobs, April Jewell, Joe Llama, Victoria Meadows, Shouleh Nikzad, Constance Spittler, Mark Swain, Robert Zellem

Author Affiliations +

Proceedings Volume 10699, Space Telescopes and Instrumentation 2018: Ultraviolet to Gamma Ray; 106990F (2018) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2315543
Event: SPIE Astronomical Telescopes + Instrumentation, 2018, Austin, Texas, United States

Abstract

Roughly 40 billion M dwarfs in our galaxy host at least one small planet in the habitable zone (HZ). The stellar ultraviolet (UV) radiation from M dwarfs is strong and highly variable, and impacts planetary atmospheric loss, composition and habitability. These effects are amplified by the extreme proximity of their HZs (0.1–0.4 AU). Knowing the UV environments of M dwarf planets will be crucial to understanding their atmospheric composition and a key parameter in discriminating between biological and abiotic sources for observed biosignatures. The Star-Planet Activity Research CubeSat (SPARCS) will be a 6U CubeSat devoted to photometric monitoring of M stars in the far-UV and near-UV, measuring the time-dependent spectral slope, intensity and evolution of low-mass star high-energy radiation.

Conference Presentation

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Paul A. Scowen, Evgenya L. Shkolnik, David Ardila, Travis Berman, Matthew Beasley, Judd Bowman, Michael Fitzgerald, Varoujan Gorjian, Daniel C. Jacobs, April Jewell, Joe Llama, Victoria Meadows, Shouleh Nikzad, Constance Spittler, Mark Swain, and Robert Zellem "Monitoring the high-energy radiation environment of exoplanets around low-mass stars with SPARCS (Star-Planet Activity Research CubeSat)", Proc. SPIE 10699, Space Telescopes and Instrumentation 2018: Ultraviolet to Gamma Ray, 106990F (6 July 2018); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2315543

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