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About Me

Education Employment Fellowships, Grants & Awards Publications & Talks Others

My Research

Low-Mass Binaries Planets Around M-dwarfs Robotic Instrumentation Others

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Mercedes López-Morales

Carnegie Institution of Washington

Department of Terrestrial Magnetism

5241 Broad Branch Rd. NW

Washington D.C. 20015

Office: 202 478 8480

Fax: 202 478 8821

E-mail: mercedes [@dtm.ciw.edu]

Currently a Hubble fellow at the Carnegie Institution of Washington

(Department of Terrestrial Magnetism), my research interests are mainly

focused on the study of the mass-radius relation of very low-mass stars

, ultra-high precision photometry of bright stars, robotic astronomical

instrumentation, and the search for planets around M-dwarfs.

Copy of C.V.

Fundamental Parameters of Low-Mass Stars

The most fundamental parameters of stars are

their masses and radii. I am pursuing a search

for eclipsing binaries composed of stars between

1.0 - 0.1 Msun. My goal is to derive a precise

observational Mass-Radius relation for stars

below 1 Msun.

High Precision Photometry

A typical extrasolar planet transit lasts 2-4 hours

and has a depth of 1-3 percent. High precision

photometry allows us to detect those transits.

I have started a program at the 1m Swope telescope

at Las Campanas Observatory (Chile) to monitor

possible transits of known planets around bright

stars. See the first results of that project here: paper1, paper2

Robotic Astronomical Instrumentation

Robotic instrumentation is becoming a popular tool

in modern astronomy, with a wide variety of scientific.

applications. The Pisgah Survey was my first robotic

telescope. This telescope is the prototype for PROMPT.

Currently we are building APT-North & APT-South.

©2004 mercedes [@ dtm.ciw.edu] | Last Update: Sep, 1 2007