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Wide Angle Search for Planets

WASP cameras on OMI mount
Abbreviation	WASP
Purpose	Search for distant planets
Region served	La Palma and Sutherland
Membership	Eight universities
Website	WASP planets

WASP (Wide Angle Search for Planets) is an international academic organisation performing an ultra-wide angle search for transiting extrasolar planets with the aim of covering the entire sky down to ~13th magnitude.

Equipment

WASP consists of two robotic observatories; SuperWASP-North at Roque de los Muchachos Observatory on the island of La Palma in the Canaries and WASP-South at the South African Astronomical Observatory, South Africa. Each observatory consists of an array of eight Canon 200 mm f1.8 lenses backed by high quality 2048 x 2048 science grade CCDs, the model used is the iKon-L manufactured by Andor Technology. The telescopes are mounted on an equatorial telescope mount built by Optical Mechanics, Inc.. The large field of view of the Canon lenses gives each observatory a massive sky coverage of 490 square degrees per pointing.

Function

The observatories continuously monitor the sky, taking a set of images approximately once per minute, gathering up to 100 gigabytes of data per night. By using the transit method, data collected from WASP can be used to measure the brightness of each star in each image, and small dips in brightness caused by large planets passing in front of their parent stars can be searched for.

One of the main purpose of WASP was to revolutionize the understanding of planet formation, paving the way for future space missions searching for 'Earth'-like worlds.

Structure

WASP is operated by a consortium of academic institutions which include:

• Instituto de Astrofisica de Canarias
• Isaac Newton Group of Telescopes
• Keele University
• University of Leicester
• Open University
• Queen's University Belfast
• St. Andrews University
• Warwick University.

On 26 September 2006, the team reported the discovery of two extrasolar planets: WASP-1b (orbiting 6 million km from star once every 2.5 days) and WASP-2b (orbiting 4.5 million km from star once every 2 days).

On 31 October 2007, the team reported the discovery of three extrasolar planets: WASP-3b, WASP-4b and WASP-5b. All three planets are similar to Jovian mass and are so close to their respective stars that their orbital periods are all less than two days. These are among the shortest orbital periods discovered. The surface temperatures of the planets should be more than 2000 degrees Celsius, owing to their short distances from their respective stars. The discoveries make the WASP team the first and only one to detect planets in both the northern and southern hemispheres using the transit detection technique. The WASP-4b and WASP-5b planets are the first planets discovered by the WASP project's cameras in South Africa, while WASP-3b is the third planet discovered by the WASP project's cameras in La Palma.

In August 2009, the discovery of WASP-17b was announced, believed to be the first planet ever discovered to orbit in the opposite direction to the spin of its star, WASP-17.

Planets discovered by WASP and its follow-up observations

Notes

• Note a: The celestial coordinates and the standard catalog identification for the parent star have not been released for WASP-9b as of 2010-04-02.

See also

• List of extrasolar planets
• Roque de los Muchachos Observatory
• South African Astronomical Observatory
• Science and Technology Facilities Council

References

1. SuperWASP: Wide Angle Search for Planets
2. http://www.superwasp.org/technical.htm
3. http://www.andor.com
4. http://www.opticalmechanics.com/news/index.html
5. Current status of the SuperWASP project, D. J. Christian et al.
6. Wide-eyed Telescope Finds its First Transiting Planets Around Distant Stars (PDF requires acrobat reader)
7. UK planet hunters announce three new finds (PDF requires acrobat reader)
8. http://arxiv.org/abs/1406.6942

External links

• WASP primary website
• WASP-South live status
• Public archive at the NASA Exoplanet Archive
• The Extrasolar Planets Encyclopaedia

News items

• QUB in April 2008
• Reaching for the stars in October 2007
• BBC News report: Planets have scientists buzzing in September 2006

Video clips

• Keele University
• McCormac, James. "Planet Hunting". Deep Space Videos. Brady Haran.

v t e Exoplanet search projects
Exoplanetology Exoplanet
Ground-based	AAPS APF CORALIE EAPSNet ELODIE EPICS ESPRESSO FINDS Exo-Earths Geneva HARPS HARPS-N GPI HATNet HEK HiCIAO HIRES KELT LCES Magellan MARVELS MASCARA MEarth MicroFUN MINERVA Australis MOA N2K NGTS NESSI OGLE OPSP PlanetPol Project 1640 PARAS SEEDS SETI SOPHIE SPECULOOS SPHERE SuperWASP Systemic TrES XO Telescope ZIMPOL/CHEOPS
Space missions	Past MOST (2003–2019) SWEEPS using HST (2006) CoRoT (2006–2013) EPOXI using Deep Impact (2008–2013) Kepler (2009–2018) detected exoplanets ASTERIA (2017–2020) Current Gaia (2013–present) TESS (2018–present) CHEOPS (2019–present) Hayabusa2 (2021–present) James Webb Space Telescope (2021–present) Planned PLATO (2026) ARIEL (2029) Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope (mid-2020s) Proposed EXCEDE HabEx LIFE LUVOIR Nautilus Deep Space Observatory New Worlds Mission OST PEGASE Cancelled Darwin EChO Eddington Space Interferometry Mission Terrestrial Planet Finder
Related	Detection methods Discoveries of exoplanets Habitable zone for complex life Lists of exoplanets nearest
Category Commons

28°45′37″N 17°52′45″W / 28.76023°N 17.87930°W / 28.76023; -17.87930

• Use dmy dates from March 2013
• Exoplanet search projects
• Astronomical surveys
• Robotic telescopes
• Astronomical observatories in South Africa
• Astronomical observatories in La Palma
• Astronomy organizations