Exoplanets around nearby small stars present the best opportunity for futureatmospheric studies with the James Webb Space Telescope and the ground basedELTs under construction. The MEarth Project has discovered a rocky planet with aperiod of 24.73 days residing in the habitable zone of the nearby, spun- downstar LHS 1140. We seek to detect the high energy emission from LHS 1140 in orderto constrain atmospheric escape and aid future studies of LHS 1140b.satmosphere, which are already planned in the JWST GTO program. In addition, LHS1140 is representative of the low mass, slowly rotating population of M dwarfsin the Milky Way. A deep X-ray exposure on this extremum of the stellarpopulation will shed insight into the magnetic dynamo and high energy processes ongoing in these stars.
Instrument
EMOS1, EMOS2, EPN, OM, RGS1, RGS2
Temporal Coverage
2018-12-21T12:20:03Z/2018-12-22T06:06:43Z
Version
17.56_20190403_1200
Mission Description
The European Space Agencys (ESA) X-ray Multi-Mirror Mission (XMM-Newton) was launched by an Ariane 504 on December 10th 1999. XMM-Newton is ESAs second cornerstone of the Horizon 2000 Science Programme. It carries 3 high throughput X-ray telescopes with an unprecedented effective area, and an optical monitor, the first flown on a X-ray observatory. The large collecting area and ability to make long uninterrupted exposures provide highly sensitive observations. Since Earths atmosphere blocks out all X-rays, only a telescope in space can detect and study celestial X-ray sources. The XMM-Newton mission is helping scientists to solve a number of cosmic mysteries, ranging from the enigmatic black holes to the origins of the Universe itself. Observing time on XMM-Newton is being made available to the scientific community, applying for observational periods on a competitive basis.
European Space Agency, Dr Jason Dittmann, 2020, 'Assessing the high-energy environment of the habitable zone planet LHS 1140b', 17.56_20190403_1200, European Space Agency, https://doi.org/10.5270/esa-8q1yeks
