M-DWARFS ARE ENTICING TARGETS FOR EXOPLANET SURVEYS WITH THE RELATIVE EASE OF FINDING TRANSITING SMALL HABITABLE-ZONE PLANETS. TESS WILL PROVIDE ~500-1000 PLANETS TRANSITING M-DWARFS A DOZEN OF WHICH WILL BE IN THE HABITABLE ZONE AND BRIGHT ENOUGH FOR ATMOSPHERIC PROBING BY THE UPCOMING JWST. HOWEVER OUR KNOWLEDGE OF THESE PLANETS IS DEPENDENT ON OUR KNOWLEDGE OF THE HOST STARS AND FOR M-DWARFS MANY UNCERTAINTIES REMAIN BECAUSE SO FEW OF THESE STARS ARE WELL-CHARACTERISED. CONSEQUENTLY INVESTIGATIONS OF PLANETS ORBITING M-DWARFS WILL REMAIN FRUSTRATED. THE ECLIPSING BINARY LOW MASS (EBLM) PROGRAM WAS CREATED TO SOLVE THIS PROBLEM. OVER 400 ECLIPSING BINARIES HAVE BEEN FOUND COMPOSED OF F/G + M STARS ROUGHLY EVENLY SPLIT BETWEEN THE NORTHERN AND SOUTHERN HEMISPHERES. THROUGH OVER TEN YEARS OF RADIAL VELOCITIES WE HAVE MEASURED MASSES AND METALLICITIES. WE NOW REQUIRE A CONSISTENT SET OF LIGHT-CURVES WITH SUFFICIENT PRECISION AND TIME RESOLUTION TO OBTAIN PRIMARY AND SECONDARY ECLIPSES SUCH THAT WE CAN PRECISELY MEASURE THE M-DWARF RADIUS AND TEMPERATURE. OUR SOUTHERN SAMPLE WAS ALREADY OBSERVED IN TESS CYCLE 1 (G011278 PI O. TURNER). BY ALSO OBSERVING THE NORTHERN SAMPLE IN CYCLE 2 AND FUNDING ITS ANALYSIS WE WILL PRODUCE THE MOST COMPREHENSIVE AND WELL-CHARACTERIZED SAMPLE OF M-DWARFS KNOWN AND SIGNIFICANTLY REFINE THE MASS-RADIUS-COMPOSITION-TEMPERATURE RELATION.
$14,615FY2020National Aeronautics and Space AdministrationNASA
University Of Chicago, Chicago IL