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Centro de Astrofísica da Universidade do Porto
A New Era for Exoplanet Imaging

Gael Chauvin
Institut de Planétologie et d'Astrophysique de Grenoble

Abstract
With the development of high contrast imaging instruments and techniques, vast efforts have been devoted during the past decade to detect and characterize lighter, cooler and closer companions to nearby stars, and ultimately image new planetary systems. Complementary to other observing techniques (radial velocity, transit, micro-lensing, pulsar-timing and astrometry), this approach has opened a new astrophysical window to study the physical properties and the formation and evolution mechanisms of giant planets at orbits larger than a few AUs. I will present the main motivations to use deep imaging to search for exoplanets and review the constant progress achieved thanks to improved performances of advanced instrumentation and data analysis techniques. I will particularly insist on the exciting and attractive perspectives offered with the forthcoming SPHERE planet imager that will arrive on sky in early-2013.

1 June 2012, 13:30

Centro de Astrofísica
Rua das Estrelas
4150-762 Porto

Institute of Astrophysics and Space Sciences

Institute of Astrophysics and Space Sciences (IA) is a new but long anticipated research infrastructure with a national dimension. It embodies a bold but feasible vision for the development of Astronomy, Astrophysics and Space Sciences in Portugal, taking full advantage and fully realizing the potential created by the national membership of the European Space Agency (ESA) and the European Southern Observatory (ESO). IA resulted from the merging the two most prominent research units in the field in Portugal: the Centre for Astrophysics of the University of Porto (CAUP) and the Center for Astronomy and Astrophysics of the University of Lisbon (CAAUL). It currently hosts more than two-thirds of all active researchers working in Space Sciences in Portugal, and is responsible for an even greater fraction of the national productivity in international ISI journals in the area of Space Sciences. This is the scientific area with the highest relative impact factor (1.65 times above the international average) and the field with the highest average number of citations per article for Portugal.

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