SIC News Interview
A team of Portuguese researchers embarks this Saturday for the Atacama Desert, in Chile, to install a solar telescope developed in Portugal that could help overcome one of the biggest obstacles in the discovery of Earth-like planets.
A team of 12 researchers from the Institute of Astrophysics and Space Sciences and the Faculty of Sciences of the University of Lisbon takes the new (Paranal solar ESPRESSO Telescope) Developed and assembled largely in the Science laboratories of the University of Lisbon, it will be integrated into the do
The telescope is expected to begin collecting the first data on April 8.
An instrument to solve the problem of “star noise”
The main objective of the new instrument is to help solve one of the biggest challenges in the search for Earth-like planets.
This phenomenon refers to the natural activity of stars, such as sunspots or variations on their surface, which can make it difficult to identify signals caused by planets.
“PoET will allow us to observe the Sun and direct its light to one of the most precise spectrographs in the world, ESPRESSO, installed in one of the telescopes at the European Southern Observatory and which has already been partially developed by the team at the Institute of Astrophysics and Space Sciences.”
This system will allow you to analyze sunlight in great detail.
“It will allow us to obtain data about the Sun, as a whole and specific areas, such as sunspots, with a level of precision that has never been achieved.”
A step towards finding other Earths
With more accurate data on solar activity, scientists hope to be able to better distinguish signals caused by planets around other stars.
“The most interesting discovery will be finding a planet identical to Earth.”
As he explains, the ESPRESSO spectrograph already has the capacity to detect very subtle signals, but the noise caused by the activity of stars continues to be one of the main limitations.
“The ESPRESSO instrument could make this possible, but it will be PoET that definitively opens this door, by helping to solve the problem of ‘stellar noise’, which today constitutes the main limitation to achieving this objective.”
Observations of the Sun can also help study phenomena that affect Earth
The telescope will not just be used to study ‘stellar noise’ and exoplanets. The data collected may also contribute to the study of solar physics.
“Stellar noise is not the only scientific phenomenon that will be studied with PoET. At the Institute of Astrophysics we have researchers dedicated to other areas of stellar physics, including solar phenomena that could impact the Earth.”
There is strong expectation in the international scientific community “who followed the development of PoET in workshops we organized and who now awaits with great anticipation the first data from the instrument.”
An instrument entirely developed by a Portuguese team
PoET was developed by Portuguese researchers from the Institute of Astrophysics and Space Sciences, the Faculty of Sciences of the University of Lisbon and the Astrophysics Center of the University of Porto, who were responsible for the design, integration and testing of the entire system.
“It is the result of more than two decades of work by the Institute of Astrophysics and Space Sciences in the area of astronomical instrumentation.”
The team will also be responsible for managing the scientific exploration of this instrument. According to the researcher, Portuguese participation in the construction of instrumentation for the European Southern Observatory has been increasing.
“This mission is already in addition to the 20 that have been carried out in the last 15 years. Portugal has a significant and well-reputed participation in this infrastructure.”
After installation in Chile, the team’s most anticipated moment will be when the telescope observes the Sun for the first time.
“Right now, the first light from the instrument, scheduled for the first days of April, is certainly the most eagerly awaited moment.”
