Download CoRoT: a space project to listen to the songs of the stars

CoRoT: a space satellite to listen to the songs of the stars
CoRoT, an ambitious European space satellite, is going to
be launched on December 27, 2006. Its main purpose is to study the
interiors of the stars and to detect planets orbiting around the
Sun-like stars (the acronym CoRoT stands for Convection and
Rotation of stars and planetary Transits. CoRoT is a mission of the French CNES
space agency in partnership with the European Space Agency ESA. It will be
launched from a Soyuz 2-1B, at the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. This
European space mission is expected to be at work for 3 years.
Payload mass of CoRoT will be about 300 kg and will orbit at an altitude of 896 km
(Courtesy of http://corot.oamp.fr/)
Stars are balls of gas in equilibrium under the action of gravity.
Many stars can vibrate in different modes like a musical instrument.
For example, vibrations detected on the surface of the Sun have been well
known for more than three decades. The stellar pulsations are
difficult to detect as the stars are very distant and the periods in Sun-like stars
are only few minutes with amplitudes only a few meters. But studies
of the Sun's oscillations have given scientists a tremendous amount
of information about the internal structure of the Sun which is
otherwise too opaque to be seen. It is therefore hoped that this new
space mission will provide data which will help scientists to study
the periods, amplitudes and even the life-times of the stars.
The Asteroseismology team at the University of Sheffield, led by Professor
Michael Thompson, is excited about this project as it is
expected to shed new light on the evolution of our Universe by
investigating transport and mixing phenomena in stars of different
mass, age and chemical composition.
Power of oscillations as a function of frequency for different stars.
(Courtesy of H. Kjeldsen)