Kilodegree Extremely Little Telescope
KELT Telescopes
KELT consists of two telescopes, KELT-North in Arizona in the United States, and KELT-South at the SAAO observing station near Sutherland, South Africa.
Each KELT telescope consists of a wide field (26 degrees × 26 degrees) medium format telephoto lens with a 4.2 cm aperture, mounted in front of a 4k × 4k Apogee CCD. Each can also be equipped with an alternative narrower field (10.8 degrees × 10.8 degrees) lens with a 7.1 cm aperture for a narrow angle campaign mode. KELT-North uses an Apogee AP16E camera, while KELT South uses an Apogee U16M. The optical assemblies and cameras are mounted on Paramount ME mounts manufactured by Software Bisque. The telescopes were made with off-the-shelf components, and were thus much cheaper than many observatories.
- KELT-North is located at Winer Observatory in southeastern Arizona, about an hour's drive from Tucson. KELT-North was installed at Winer in 2005, and operated continuously until 2022, with occasional interruptions for equipment failures and poor weather. KELT-North was decommissioned in 2022.
- KELT-South is located at the Sutherland astronomical observation station owned and operated by SAAO, about 370 kilometers (230 mi) North of Cape Town. KELT-South was deployed at Sutherland in 2009.
Goals
KELT is dedicated to discovering transiting exoplanets orbiting stars in the apparent magnitude range of 8 < V < 10. This is the region just fainter than the set of stars comprehensively surveyed for planets by the radial-velocity surveys, but brighter than those typically observed by most transit surveys.
Operations
Both KELT telescopes operate by sequentially observing a series of predefined fields around the sky all night, every night when the weather is good. All recordings are made with 150-second exposures, optimized to observe stars in the target magnitude range.
Discoveries
KELT has made several exoplanet discoveries and at least one brown dwarf (which may be an extremely massive Super-Jupiter instead) to date. Yellow rows in the table below indicate the planet is contained in a binary system.
Exoplanets
Star | Constellation | Right ascension |
Declination | App. mag. |
Distance (ly) | Spectral type |
Planet | Mass (MJ) |
Radius (RJ) |
Density (g/cm) |
Orbital period (d) |
Semimajor axis (AU) |
Orbital eccentricity |
Inclination (°) |
Discovery year |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
KELT-2A | Auriga | 06 10 39 | +30° 57′ 26″ | 8.77 | 420 | F7V | KELT-2Ab | 1.486 | 1.306 | 4.11379 | 0.05498 | 0.0 | 88.5 | 2012 | |
KELT-3 | Leo | 09 54 34.0 | +30° 38′ 24″ | 9.8 | 580 | F6V | KELT-3b | 1.418 | 1.333 | 0.75 | 2.70339 | 0.04117 | 0.0 | 84.32 | 2012 |
KELT-4A | Leo | 10 28 15.011 | +25° 34′ 23.5″ | 9.98 | 685 | F8V | KELT-4Ab | 0.878 | 1.706 | 2.9895933 | 0.04321 | 0.0 | 83.11 | 2015 | |
KELT-6 | Coma Berenices | 13 03 56 | +30° 38′ 24″ | 10.38 | 724 | F8IV | KELT-6b | 0.43 | 1.19 | 0.311 | 7.84563 | 0.079 | 0.22 −0.10 |
88.81 | 2013 |
KELT-6c | 3.71 | 1.16 | 1,276 | 2.39 | 0.21 | 2015 | |||||||||
KELT-7 | Auriga | 05 13 11 | +33° 19′ 05″ | 8.54 | 420 | F2V | KELT-7b | 1.28 | 1.533 | 0.442 | 2.7347749 | 0.04415 | 0.0 | 83.76 | 2015 |
KELT-8 | Hercules | 18 53 13.31 | 24° 07′ 38.09″ | 10.85 | 664 | G2V | KELT-8b | 0.66 | 1.62 | 0.165 | 3.24 | 0.04550 | 0.04±0.05 | 82.65±0.90 | 2015 |
KELT-9 | Cygnus | 20 31 27 | +39° 56′ 20″ | 7.56 | 620 | B9.5V | KELT-9b | 2015 | |||||||
KELT-10 | Telescopium | 18 58 11.61 | −47° 00′ 11.91″ | 10.62 | 614 | G0V | KELT-10b | 0.68 | 1.4 | 0.308 | 4.17 | 0.05250 | 0? | 88.61 | 2015 |
KELT-11 | Sextans | 10 46 49.66 | −09° 23′ 57.71″ | 8.04 | 323 | G8/K0IV | KELT-11b | 0.171 | 1.35 | 0.009 | 4.74 | 0.06±0.005 | 0.0007±0.0015 | 85.3±0.2 | 2017 |
KELT-12 | Hercules | 17 50 33.72 | +36° 34′ 12.63″ | 10.59 | 1200 | F7III-IV | KELT-12b | 0.95 | 1.78 | 0.209 | 5.03 | 0.06708 | 0.0 | 84.47±0.15 | 2017 |
KELT-13/WASP-167 | Centaurus | 13 04 10.51 | −35° 32′ 58.31″ | 10.571 | 1381 | F1V | KELT-13/WASP-167b | <8 | 1.58 | 2.02 | 0.0365 | 79.9 | 2017 | ||
KELT-14/WASP-122 | Puppis | 7 13 12.34 | −42° 24′ 35.14″ | 11 | 816 | G2V | KELT-14/WASP-122b | 1.284 | 1.743 | 0.322 | 1.71 | 0.03 | 0.0 | 78.3 | 2016 |
KELT-15 | Carina | 07 49 39.59 | −52° 07′ 13.57″ | 11.39 | 1,068 | G0V | KELT-15Ab | 0.91 | 1.443 | 0.36 | 3.33 | 0.04 | 0 | 88.3 | 2015 |
KELT-16 | Cygnus | 20 57 04.44 | +31° 39′ 39.63″ | 11.72 | 1,469 | F7V | KELT-16Ab | 2.75 | 1.415 | 1.20 ± 0.18 | 0.97 | 0.02 | 0 | 84.4 | 2017 |
KELT-17 | Cancer | 8 22 28.20 | +13° 44′ 07.14″ | 9.23 | 743 | A7V | KELT-17b | 1.32 | 1.525 | 0.46 | 3.08 | 0.05 | 84.87 | 2016 | |
KELT-18 | Ursa Major | 14 26 05.76 | +59° 26′ 39.29″ | 10.16 | 1,057 | F4V | KELT-18Ab | 1.18 | 1.57 | 0.377 | 2.87 | 0.04 | 0 | 82.90 | 2017 |
KELT-19 | Canis Minor | 07 26 02.29 | +07° 36′ 56.18″ | 9.86 | 987 | A8V | KELT-19Ab | <4.07 | 1.91 | <0.744 | 4.61 | 0.064 | 85.14 | 2017 | |
KELT-20 | Cygnus | 19 38 38.74 | +31° 31′ 09.22″ | 7.58 | 446 | A2V | KELT-20b | <3.382 | 1.741 | <0.806 | 3.474 | 0.05 | 0? | 86.12 | 2017 |
KELT-21 | Cygnus | 20 19 12.00 | +32° 34′ 51.76″ | 10.48 | 1,556 | A6V | KELT-21b | <3.91 | 1.586 | <1.24 | 3.612 | 0.05 | 0 | 86.46 | 2018 |
KELT-22/WASP-173 | Sculptor | 23 36 40.38 | −34° 36′ 42.68″ | 11.3 | 766 | G3V | KELT-22/WASP-173Ab | 3.47 | 1.285 | 2.02 | 1.386 | 0.02 | 0 | 85.2 | 2018 |
KELT-23 | Ursa Minor | 15 28 35.19 | +66° 21′ 31.54″ | 10.31 | 413 | G1V | KELT-23b | 0.94 | 1.32 | 0.503 | 2.26 | 0.03 | 0 | 85.37 | 2019 |
KELT-24 | Ursa Major | 10 47 38.35 | +71° 39′ 21.16″ | 8.33 | 316 | F5.5V | KELT-24b | 5.18 | 1.27 | 3.13 | 5.55 | 0.07 | 0.08 | 89.17 | 2019 |
KELT-25 | Canis Major | 07 12 29.55 | −24° 57′ 12.82″ | 9.63 | 1,443 | A4V | |||||||||
KELT-26/WASP-178 | Lupus | 15 09 04.89 | −42° 42′ 17.79″ | 9.95 | 1,410 | A1V | KELT-26/WASP-178b | 1.41 | 1.94 | 0.238 | 3.35 | 0.06 | 0 | 84.45 | 2019 |
Brown dwarfs
In addition, the survey has discovered brown dwarfs like KELT-1b.
Star | Constellation | Right ascension |
Declination | App. mag. |
Distance (ly) | Spectral type |
Planet | Mass (MJ) |
Radius (RJ) |
Density (g/cm) |
Orbital period (d) |
Semimajor axis (AU) |
Orbital eccentricity |
Inclination (°) |
Discovery year |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
KELT-1 | Andromeda | 00 01 26.92 | +39° 23′ 01.7″ | 10.00 | 854 | F5V | KELT-1b | 27.23 | 1.110 | 1.217513 | 0.0247 | 0.0 | 87.80 |
References
- ^ "The Ohio State University Department of Astronomy".
- ^ "Vanderbilt Department of Physics and Astronomy". Archived from the original on 2012-06-16. Retrieved 2012-06-12.
- ^ "Vanderbilt Astronomy Group".
- ^ "The Lehigh Department of Physics".
- ^ "South African Astronomical Observatory".
- ^ Pepper, Joshua; et al. (2007). "The Kilodegree Extremely Little Telescope (KELT): A Small Robotic Telescope for Large-Area Synoptic Surveys". Publications of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific. 119 (858): 923–935. arXiv:0704.0460. Bibcode:2007PASP..119..923P. doi:10.1086/521836. S2CID 13967723.
- ^ Pepper; et al. (2012). "The KELT-South Telescope". Publications of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific. 124 (913): 230–241. arXiv:1202.1826. Bibcode:2012PASP..124..230P. doi:10.1086/665044. S2CID 119207060.
- ^ "Paramount ME". Archived from the original on 2012-07-02.
- ^ "Software Bisque company page".
- ^ Sample, Ian (2017-06-05). "Kelt-9b: astronomers discover hottest known giant planet". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved 2023-11-28.
- ^ Oberst, Thomas E.; Rodriguez, Joseph E.; Colón, Knicole D.; Angerhausen, Daniel; Bieryla, Allyson; Ngo, Henry; Stevens, Daniel J.; Stassun, Keivan G.; Gaudi, B. Scott; Pepper, Joshua; Penev, Kaloyan; Mawet, Dimitri; Latham, David W.; Heintz, Tyler M.; Osei, Baffour W.; Collins, Karen A.; Kielkopf, John F.; Visgaitis, Tiffany; Reed, Phillip A.; Escamilla, Alejandra; Yazdi, Sormeh; McLeod, Kim K.; Lunsford, Leanne T.; Spencer, Michelle; Joner, Michael D.; Gregorio, Joao; Gaillard, Clement; Matt, Kyle; Dumont, Mary Thea; et al. (2017). "KELT-16b: A Highly Irradiated, Ultra-short Period Hot Jupiter Nearing Tidal Disruption". The Astronomical Journal. 153 (3): 97. arXiv:1608.00618. Bibcode:2017AJ....153...97O. doi:10.3847/1538-3881/153/3/97. S2CID 42949556.
- ^ McLeod, Kim K.; Rodriguez, Joseph E.; Oelkers, Ryan J.; Collins, Karen A.; Bieryla, Allyson; Fulton, Benjamin J.; Stassun, Keivan G.; Gaudi, B. Scott; Penev, Kaloyan; Stevens, Daniel J.; Colón, Knicole D.; Pepper, Joshua; Narita, Norio; Tsuguru, Ryu; Fukui, Akihiko; Reed, Phillip A.; Tirrell, Bethany; Visgaitis, Tiffany; Kielkopf, John F.; Cohen, David H.; Jensen, Eric L. N.; Gregorio, Joao; Baştürk, Özgür; Oberst, Thomas E.; Melton, Casey; Kempton, Eliza M.-R.; Baldrige, Andrew; Zhao, Y. Sunny; Zambelli, Roberto; et al. (2017). "KELT-18b: Puffy Planet, Hot Host, Probably Perturbed". The Astronomical Journal. 153 (6): 263. arXiv:1702.01657. Bibcode:2017AJ....153..263M. doi:10.3847/1538-3881/aa6d5d. S2CID 54667386.
External links
- KELT-North survey website Archived 2019-01-24 at the Wayback Machine
- KELT-South survey website