NASA Exoplanet Science Institute Headlines
Announcing the NASA Exoplanet Science Institute
The Michelson Science Center has been renamed the NASA Exoplanet Science Institute (NExScI). NExScI is the science operations and analysis center for NASA's Exoplanet Exploration Program and will continue to support all MSC activities including tools and archives for the exoplanet community, the Sagan program of fellowships and workshops, support of the Keck Interferometer and administration of the NASA Keck telescope time.
2009 Sagan/Michelson Fellows Symposium
NExScI will host the Sagan/Michelson Fellows symposium Nov. 12-13, 2009 at Caltech. The symposium is a forum for current and past Sagan/Michelson graduate student and postdoctoral fellows to present current or past research results. Click here to register and for more information.2010A Call for NASA Keck Observing Proposals
On-line proposal submission for NASA's portion of the 2010A Keck time is now available. This call is now closed. NASA has opened up the call to a wider range of disciplines. In addition, a portion of the time will be devoted to CoRoT Key Science projects. More information...Sagan Summer Workshop
Presentations and photos now available! The 2009 Sagan Summer Workshop was held July 20-24, 2009. It consisted of tutorial discussions covering theory and observations of exoplanetary atmospheres including what we can learn from planets in our own solar system. More ...New Version of Visibility Modeling Tool Available
NExScI announces the release of version 2.0 of the Visibility Modeling Tool (VMT 2.0). More...New Version of SIM Lite Time and Performance Estimator Available
NExScI announces a new version of the SIM Time & Performance Estimator (TaPE 2.0), a web-based tool that allows prospective observers to explore the capabilities of SIM Lite. More...2010 Call for Applications to the Sagan Postdoctoral Fellowship Program
NExScI announces the call for applications for the 2010 Sagan Postdoctoral Fellowships. This call is now closed. Click here to meet the 2009 Sagan Postdoctoral Fellows. More information...
New Release of the NASA Star and Exoplanet Database
The NASA Star and Exoplanet Database (NStED) is a stellar and exoplanet archive to support NASA's planet finding and characterization activities. This version expands the stellar and exoplanet content, allowing detailed searches on 70+ parameters for over 140,000 bright, nearby stars, including all known exoplanet-hosting stars.
Winter IPAC Newsletter
The 2008-2009 IPAC Newsletter is available with news of NExScI and the wider world of IPAC.51 Ophiuchus: A Possible Beta Pictoris Analog Measured with the Keck Interferometer Nuller
In a recent Astrophysical Journal publication a team, led by Chris Stark of the Univ. of Maryland, releases new observations made with the Keck Interferometer (KI). These observations, collected in the nulling mode, were combined with visibility and Spitzer IRS data to model the debris disk around 51 Ophiuchus. The best fit model is consistent with an inner "birth" disk of continually colliding parent bodies producing an extended envelope of ejected small grains and is similar to the disk around β Pictoris. These observations were collected using NASA Keck telescope time administered by NExScI, and were funded by a Keck PI Data Award. Read the article here.