News: Mid-April: Selection of contributed talks

The discovery of ~5800 exoplanets to date allows demographic studies, and brings the characterization of the climate and surface conditions of terrestrial exoplanets, including their potential habitability, to the forefront of exoplanet research. While JWST is already providing the first pioneering observations of transiting rocky planet atmospheres, identifying the presence of life on these planets is still largely out of reach. The next big step is to directly image and measure spectra for a statistical sample of rocky worlds. Current ground-based telescopes can detect young giant exoplanets such as PDS 70b/c, and NASA's Roman space telescope will extend our reach to mature gas giants. The ELTs will provide the angular resolution and the sensitivity to directly image rocky planets around nearby red dwarf stars. However, for statistical samples, especially for Sun-like stars, space missions are needed.

On the US side, NASA is planning the Habitable Worlds Observatory (HWO), a large space telescope capable of delivering UVOIR spectra of Earth-like planets around Sun-like stars. On the European side, the Large Interferometer For Exoplanets (LIFE) initiative is planning a nulling interferometer capable of delivering mid-infrared spectra of terrestrial planets in the habitable zones of their host stars. These two missions have very different approaches toward the same science goal, and their multi-wavelength combination would be especially powerful.

The goals of Special Session 4 are to develop scientific and technology roadmaps toward HWO and LIFE and to explore the synergies between these two mission concepts. A key aspect is precursor missions, such as ELT work, astrometry, and target selection. The meeting will maximize the combined science output of LIFE and HWO: a quantitative answer to the fundamental question whether we are alone in the Universe.

Programme

• Putting biosignatures in their (exo)planetary context
• Current observations of rocky planets and the potential of pathfinder missions
• The HWO and LIFE missions: Project status and technology readmaps

Invited speakers

• Hannah Diamond-Lowe (STScI)
• Sascha Quantz (ETH Zürich)
• Aki Roberge (NASA GSFC)
• Manuel Scherf (IWF Graz)
• More invitations pending ...

Scientific organisers

Eleonora Alei (NASA GSFC); Giada Arney (NASA GSFC); Jo Barstow (Open University); Óscar Carrión González (Obs.Paris); Christiane Helling (IWF Graz); Stefan Kraus (U Exeter, co-Chair); Laura Kreidberg (MPIA Heidelberg); Michiel Min (SRON Leiden); John Monnier (U Michigan); Floris van der Tak (SRON Groningen; Chair)

Contact

vdtak  @  sron.nl