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Amanda Quint
Missouri State University
Advisor: Dr. Mike Reed
Abstract
In March of 2009 NASA launched Kepler, a solar-orbiting telescope with the main mission of detecting and classifying planets around other stars. By measuring minute changes in a star's brightness (down to a few parts in a million), Kepler is able to detect planets transiting in front of their stars. This sensitivity in measuring a star's brightness allows Kepler to record the transits of planets as small as half the size of the Earth, and can determine if they are in or near the habitable zone of their star. However, due to both the preciseness of the equipment onboard and lack of noise in the observations, Kepler is also able to contribute to Asteroseismology, which is the study of the internal structure of stars through observing their oscillations. By measuring these oscillations over time, Kepler is able to provide new data on a variety of different stellar types, including but not limited to: Cepheids, RR Lyrae, white dwarfs and subdwarf B stars.
Amanda Quint is from Walnut Grove, Missouri. She is currently a senior at Missouri State University.
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