577 research outputs found
Gaia and VLT astrometry of faint stars: Precision of Gaia DR1 positions and updated VLT parallaxes of ultracool dwarfs
We compared positions of the Gaia first data release (DR1) secondary data set
at its faint limit with CCD positions of stars in 20 fields observed with the
VLT/FORS2 camera. The FORS2 position uncertainties are smaller than one
milli-arcsecond (mas) and allowed us to perform an independent verification of
the DR1 astrometric precision. In the fields that we observed with FORS2, we
projected the Gaia DR1 positions into the CCD plane, performed a polynomial fit
between the two sets of matching stars, and carried out statistical analyses of
the residuals in positions. The residual RMS roughly matches the expectations
given by the Gaia DR1 uncertainties, where we identified three regimes in terms
of Gaia DR1 precision: for G = 17-20 stars we found that the formal DR1
position uncertainties of stars with DR1 precisions in the range of 0.5-5 mas
are underestimated by 63 +/- 5\%, whereas the DR1 uncertainties of stars in the
range 7-10 mas are overestimated by a factor of two. For the best-measured and
generally brighter G = 16-18 stars with DR1 positional uncertainties of <0.5
mas, we detected 0.44 +/- 0.13 mas excess noise in the residual RMS, whose
origin can be in both FORS2 and Gaia DR1. By adopting Gaia DR1 as the absolute
reference frame we refined the pixel scale determination of FORS2, leading to
minor updates to the parallaxes of 20 ultracool dwarfs that we published
previously. We also updated the FORS2 absolute parallax of the Luhman 16 binary
brown dwarf system to 501.42 +/- 0.11 masComment: 7 pages, 4 figures, 2 tables, accepted for publication in A&A on
August 1, 201
Astrometric mass ratios for three spectroscopic binaries
The orbits of five single-lined spectroscopic binaries have recently been
determined. We now use astrometric measurements that were collected with the
Hipparcos satellite to constrain the systems' mass ratios and secondary masses.
The barycentric astrometric orbits of three binary systems, HD 140667, HD
158222, and HD 217924, are fully determined and precise estimates of their mass
ratios are obtained. Follow-up of these systems with infrared spectroscopy
could yield model-independent dynamical masses for all components.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figures. Research note accepted for publication in
Astronomy and Astrophysic
When Do Measures on the Space of Connections Support the Triad Operators of Loop Quantum Gravity?
In this work we investigate the question, under what conditions Hilbert
spaces that are induced by measures on the space of generalized connections
carry a representation of certain non-Abelian analogues of the electric flux.
We give the problem a precise mathematical formulation and start its
investigation. For the technically simple case of U(1) as gauge group, we
establish a number of "no-go theorems" asserting that for certain classes of
measures, the flux operators can not be represented on the corresponding
Hilbert spaces.
The flux-observables we consider play an important role in loop quantum
gravity since they can be defined without recourse to a background geometry,
and they might also be of interest in the general context of quantization of
non-Abelian gauge theories.Comment: LaTeX, 21 pages, 5 figures; v3: some typos and formulations
corrected, some clarifications added, bibliography updated; article is now
identical to published versio
Astrometric detection of exoplanets from the ground
Astrometry is a powerful technique to study the populations of extrasolar
planets around nearby stars. It gives access to a unique parameter space and is
therefore required for obtaining a comprehensive picture of the properties,
abundances, and architectures of exoplanetary systems. In this review, we
discuss the scientific potential, present the available techniques and
instruments, and highlight a few results of astrometric planet searches, with
an emphasis on observations from the ground. In particular, we discuss
astrometric observations with the Very Large Telescope (VLT) Interferometer and
a programme employing optical imaging with a VLT camera, both aimed at the
astrometric detection of exoplanets. Finally, we set these efforts into the
context of Gaia, ESA's astrometry mission scheduled for launch in 2013, and
present an outlook on the future of astrometric exoplanet detection from the
ground.Comment: 9 pages, 3 figures. Invited contribution to the SPIE conference
"Techniques and Instrumentation for Detection of Exoplanets VI" held in San
Diego, CA, August 25-29, 201
Background independent quantizations: the scalar field I
We are concerned with the issue of quantization of a scalar field in a
diffeomorphism invariant manner. We apply the method used in Loop Quantum
Gravity. It relies on the specific choice of scalar field variables referred to
as the polymer variables. The quantization, in our formulation, amounts to
introducing the `quantum' polymer *-star algebra and looking for positive
linear functionals, called states. The assumed in our paper homeomorphism
invariance allows to determine a complete class of the states. Except one, all
of them are new. In this letter we outline the main steps and conclusions, and
present the results: the GNS representations, characterization of those states
which lead to essentially self adjoint momentum operators (unbounded),
identification of the equivalence classes of the representations as well as of
the irreducible ones. The algebra and topology of the problem, the derivation,
all the technical details and more are contained in the paper-part II.Comment: 13 pages, minor corrections were made in the revised versio
Enabling science with Gaia observations of naked-eye stars
ESA's Gaia space astrometry mission is performing an all-sky survey of
stellar objects. At the beginning of the nominal mission in July 2014, an
operation scheme was adopted that enabled Gaia to routinely acquire
observations of all stars brighter than the original limit of G~6, i.e. the
naked-eye stars. Here, we describe the current status and extent of those
observations and their on-ground processing. We present an overview of the data
products generated for G<6 stars and the potential scientific applications.
Finally, we discuss how the Gaia survey could be enhanced by further exploiting
the techniques we developed.Comment: 16 pages, 8 figures. Submitted for the proceedings of the 2016 SPIE
Astronomical Instrumentation and Telescopes conference (SPIE 9904
Polymer and Fock representations for a Scalar field
In loop quantum gravity, matter fields can have support only on the
`polymer-like' excitations of quantum geometry, and their algebras of
observables and Hilbert spaces of states can not refer to a classical,
background geometry. Therefore, to adequately handle the matter sector, one has
to address two issues already at the kinematic level. First, one has to
construct the appropriate background independent operator algebras and Hilbert
spaces. Second, to make contact with low energy physics, one has to relate this
`polymer description' of matter fields to the standard Fock description in
Minkowski space. While this task has been completed for gauge fields, important
gaps remained in the treatment of scalar fields. The purpose of this letter is
to fill these gaps.Comment: 13 pages, no figure
Automorphism covariant representations of the holonomy-flux *-algebra
We continue an analysis of representations of cylindrical functions and
fluxes which are commonly used as elementary variables of Loop Quantum Gravity.
We consider an arbitrary principal bundle of a compact connected structure
group and following Sahlmann's ideas define a holonomy-flux *-algebra whose
elements correspond to the elementary variables. There exists a natural action
of automorphisms of the bundle on the algebra; the action generalizes the
action of analytic diffeomorphisms and gauge transformations on the algebra
considered in earlier works. We define the automorphism covariance of a
*-representation of the algebra on a Hilbert space and prove that the only
Hilbert space admitting such a representation is a direct sum of spaces L^2
given by a unique measure on the space of generalized connections. This result
is a generalization of our previous work (Class. Quantum. Grav. 20 (2003)
3543-3567, gr-qc/0302059) where we assumed that the principal bundle is
trivial, and its base manifold is R^d.Comment: 34 pages, 1 figure, LaTeX2e, minor clarifying remark
Testing the Master Constraint Programme for Loop Quantum Gravity IV. Free Field Theories
This is the fourth paper in our series of five in which we test the Master
Constraint Programme for solving the Hamiltonian constraint in Loop Quantum
Gravity. We now move on to free field theories with constraints, namely Maxwell
theory and linearized gravity. Since the Master constraint involves squares of
constraint operator valued distributions, one has to be very careful in doing
that and we will see that the full flexibility of the Master Constraint
Programme must be exploited in order to arrive at sensible results.Comment: 23 pages, no figure
Testing the Master Constraint Programme for Loop Quantum Gravity III. SL(2,R) Models
This is the third paper in our series of five in which we test the Master
Constraint Programme for solving the Hamiltonian constraint in Loop Quantum
Gravity. In this work we analyze models which, despite the fact that the phase
space is finite dimensional, are much more complicated than in the second
paper: These are systems with an SL(2,\Rl) gauge symmetry and the
complications arise because non -- compact semisimple Lie groups are not
amenable (have no finite translation invariant measure). This leads to severe
obstacles in the refined algebraic quantization programme (group averaging) and
we see a trace of that in the fact that the spectrum of the Master Constraint
does not contain the point zero. However, the minimum of the spectrum is of
order which can be interpreted as a normal ordering constant arising
from first class constraints (while second class systems lead to normal
ordering constants). The physical Hilbert space can then be be obtained after
subtracting this normal ordering correction.Comment: 33 pages, no figure
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