FLASH Talks: Melinda Soares-Furtado (University of Wisconsin-Madison)


Friday, 20 May 2022 noon — 1 p.m. MST

FLASH Talks
Melinda Soares-Furtado (University of Wisconsin-Madison)

Melinda Soares-Furtado (Wisconsin)

Unveiling Young, Nearby Exosatellites with Infrared, Space-Based Surveys

I present the design considerations and wide-ranging science outcomes that would accompany the proposed Transiting Exosatellites, Moons, and Planets in Orion (TEMPO) Survey. A survey like TEMPO would offer the community a 30-day, time-domain photometric investigation of young star-forming regions using a wide-field, infrared, space satellite. TEMPO proposes to survey the nearby (400 pc) Orion Nebula Cluster (1-3 Myr) with the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope. A TEMPO-like survey is expected to unveil a population of exosatellites that are still in the early phases of their formation and evolution. I will describe the model-derived detection yields that would accompany such a survey, which includes a population of "super Titan" exosatellites and proto-habitable-zone systems that are analogs of the young Trappist 1 system. Theories predict that these young sources should be in possession of significant H/He envelopes, however, few constraints are available to distinguish between degenerate mechanisms. A TEMPO-like survey would provide data-derived constraints on the envelope accretion and depletion processes and could be leveraged to constrain the lower end of the initial mass function.

FLASH Talks are scientific talks for the staff at NOIRLab and the University of Arizona's Steward Observatory. 

If you or a collaborator are interested in presenting at FLASH please get in touch. All FLASH talks are virtual for the foreseeable future, so feel free to suggest speakers from outside of Tucson!