Abstract:
The discovery of the first transiting, potentially earth-like planets by projects like TESS, PLATO, SPECULOUS, MEarth, etc is just around the corner. Once discovered, those planets will immediately become the focus of observations in search for atmospheric biomarkers, such as H2O, CH4, O3, and O2. Given current and planned instrumentation, H2O, CH4, O3 will be best searched for from space. O2, on the other hand, will be best observed from the ground. Here I present ongoing work centered around optimizing the search for O2 in earth-like planets using high-resolution, doppler velocity techniques. I will show results of investigations of a series of technical and observational parameters, which will produce the most sensitive observations of O2 with instrumentation on the upcoming generation of extremely large telescopes (GMT, TMT, ELT).

Host: Diana Dragomir