HR: 0830h
AN: P21E-01    [Abstracts]
TI: Search for Radio Emissions from Extrasolar Planets: The Observation Campaign
AU: * Winterhalter, D
EM: daniel.winterhalter@jpl.nasa.gov
AF: Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, 4800 Oak Grove Drive, Pasadena, CA 91109-8099 United States
AU: Bryden, G
EM: geoffrey.bryden@jpl.nasa.gov
AF: Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, 4800 Oak Grove Drive, Pasadena, CA 91109-8099 United States
AU: Chandra, I C
EM: ishwar@ncra.tifr.res.in
AF: National Center for Radio Astrophysics, TFIR, Post Bag 3, Pune University Campus, Ganeshkhind, Pune, 411 007 India
AU: Gonzalez, W
EM: gonzalez@dge.inpe.br
AF: Instituto Nacional de Pesquisas Espaciais, Av dos Astronautas, 1.758 - Jd Granja, Sao Jose dos Campos, 12227-010 Brazil
AU: Kuiper, T B
EM: thomas.kuiper@jpl.nasa.gov
AF: Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, 4800 Oak Grove Drive, Pasadena, CA 91109-8099 United States
AU: Lazio, J
EM: Joseph.Lazio@nrl.navy.mil
AF: Naval Research Laboratory, 4555 Overlook Ave. S.W., Washington, DC 20375 United States
AU: Majid, W A
EM: Walid.A.Majid@jpl.nasa.gov
AF: Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, 4800 Oak Grove Drive, Pasadena, CA 91109-8099 United States
AU: Treumann, R
EM: tre@mpe.mpg.de
AF: Max Plack Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics, PO Box 1312, Garching, D-85741 Germany
AU: Zarka, P
EM: philippe.zarka@obspm.fr
AF: Observatoire de Paris-Meudon, Bƒtiment 16, bureau 205c, 5, Place Jules Janssen, Meudon, 92195 France
AB: Non-thermal, low-frequency radio emissions have been observed for decades from planets in our solar system, and they are also expected from the magnetospheres of extrasolar planets. Particularly from "Hot Jupiters", extrasolar planets of Jupiter size that orbit their primary at very close range (<0.1 AU in some cases), we expect the radiated power to be strong enough to allow detection from Earth. This is because the energy input into a magnetosphere so close to a star is orders of magnitude larger than that experienced by our own Jupiter. Using the new 150 MHz receivers of the Giant Metrewave Radiotelescope (GMRT) in India, we have searched for radio emissions from a sub-set of known "hot Jupiters". We have selected three primary and two backup targets, based on the expected flux density and the level of background noise. No observation of these targets has been attempted previously at these frequencies with the sensitivity and aperture offered by GMRT. Calibrations with GMRT at 150 MHz have confirmed the noise floor to be 2 mJy over a 5 MHz bandwidth. The noise floor is well below the expected flux levels from the targets. Our search strategy included a focus on those planetary emissions that may be caused by impulsive events on the primary star. For this reason, the target primaries where monitored for impulsive events with near-simulatenous optical observations. This paper will describe the campaign, and present the preliminary results.
DE: 2784 Solar wind/magnetosphere interactions
DE: 6954 Radio astronomy
DE: 7534 Radio emissions
SC: Planetary Sciences [P]
MN: 2005 Joint Assembly