HORIZON 2020 - Surveying the sky in search for new planets

As empirical experiments are almost impossible in astronomy, research in this field relies heavily on observation. Prof. Andrzej Udalski set new frontiers in observational astronomy, in particular in the search for extra-solar planets, using a cutting-edge gravitational microlensing technique which enables the study of celestial objects irrespective of the light they emit.

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Innovation Funding Researchers European Research Council Space Poland

date: 09/11/2015

Project: Optical Gravitational Lensing Experiment...

acronym: OGLEIV

See also: CORDIS

The OGLEIV ERC-funded project is the fourth part of a unique long-term sky survey (OGLE), which was launched in 1992 to conduct observations in the densest stellar regions of the sky.

Prof. Udalski’s team has launched a second generation planetary microlensing survey of the Galactic Centre using a new gigantic ‘CCD’ mosaic camera which allows observation of thousands of square degrees of the sky every night. The camera is among the largest imagers worldwide and the OGLEIV survey has regularly monitored over a billion objects, making it one of the largest sky variability surveys today.