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Old 13-10-2018, 06:10 AM
alfa015 (Alberto)
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Detect exoplanets by yourself with the cheapest equipment

Hi guys,

I detected my first exoplanet (hd 189733 b) and made a video about it showing step by step how I did it. I thought it could be useful for the people interested in the topic or already starting with transit photometry.

The star has an apparent magnitude of 7.7 and the exoplanet produces a drop of 2.8% during almost 2 hours.

I used a tele-photo lens (the Pentacon 135 mm f 2.8), a CMOS camera (ZWO ASI 120 MM) and an equatorial mount (Skywatcher EQ3-2)

I also have a dual-axis motor drive, but a simple one that only controls the right ascension would be enough.

I bought most of the items second-hand from Ebay and I spent around 300 euros.

To set up the tele-photo lens and the camera I have a couple of guide rings and in order to focus the tele-photo lens, I have to separate it 33 mm from the camera by using for example 2 M42 extension rings, one of them 28 mm long and the other one 5 mm.

Now, the steps to detect the exoplanet are the following:

1. Find out when is the exoplanet going to transit the star with the
Exoplanet Transit Database.

2. With a program called SharpCap, take for example 5-second
exposures with a gain of 1 for 3 hours.

3. Once the transit has finished, with a program called ‘AstroImageJ’
open all the images, select the target star and for example a couple
of reference stars, and perform multi-aperture photometry to
detect the light curve.

I think it is better explained with a video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XHCp...ZinoGtUGEOankw
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Old 17-10-2018, 01:00 AM
dpastern (Dave Pastern)
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Nice!
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Old 17-10-2018, 02:07 AM
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silv (Annette)
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Cool. Another guy posted an article he wrote the other day on the same subject. He described a visit at a nearby group of ppl who also do what you're doing.
From his PDF
Quote:
Why is this important? So amateurs can provide critical follow‐up observations for the professional observations from the new Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS), launched April 18, 2018. TESS’s two‐year all‐sky survey will focus on nearby G, K, and M type stars, including the 1,000 closest red dwarfs in an area 400 times larger than that covered by the Kepler mission.TESS will also provide prime targets for more detailed investigation with the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) and other large ground‐based and space‐based telescopes.
TESS’s system has a 20 arcsec/pixel resolution whereas ground instruments like MSRO have a 1.4 arcsec/pixel resolution. Follow‐up readings for TESS from ground‐based instrumentation like MSRO is therefore vital to increase confidence that any light curve changes in TESS’s data are not due to background stars in its resolution field. Exoplanet research has therefore opened a new area where professional‐amateur collaboration is not only desired, but can be critically supportive
With this, recruiting more amateurs for the task at hand makes a lot of sense! Thanks for the tutorial
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Old 20-10-2018, 10:21 PM
alfa015 (Alberto)
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Thanks a lot for your kind words! I really appreciate them
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Old 22-10-2018, 12:42 AM
alfa015 (Alberto)
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Quote:
Originally Posted by silv View Post
Cool. Another guy posted an article he wrote the other day on the same subject. He described a visit at a nearby group of ppl who also do what you're doing.
From his PDF
With this, recruiting more amateurs for the task at hand makes a lot of sense! Thanks for the tutorial
Oh thanks for the pdf link ! very interesting
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