MACHO Mass Determination Based on Space Telescope Observation

Abstract

We investigate the possibility of lens mass determination for a caustic crossing microlensing event based on a space telescope observation. We demonstrate that the parallax due to the orbital motion of a space telescope causes a periodic fluctuation of the light curve, from which the lens distance can be derived. Since the proper motion of the lens relative to the source is also measurable for a caustic crossing event, one can find a full solution for microlensing properties of the event, including the lens mass. To determine the lens mass with sufficient accuracy, the light curve near the caustic crossing should be observed within uncertainty of $\sim$ 1%. We argue that the Hubble Space Telescope observation of the caustic crossing supplied with ground-based observations of the full light curve will enable us to determine the mass of MACHOs, which is crucial for understanding the nature of MACHOs.

9 pages + 3 figures, accepted for publication in ApJ Letters

References in corpus (3)

• Complete Parallax and Proper Motion Solutions For Halo Binary-Lens Microlensing Events
• Declining Rotation Curve and Brown Dwarf MACHOs
• Caustic Crossing Microlensing Event by Binary MACHOs and Time Scale Bias

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• Spitzer as Microlens Parallax Satellite: Mass and Distance Measurements of Binary Lens System OGLE-2014-BLG-1050L
• Geosynchronous Microlens Parallaxes
• Applications of Microlensing to Stellar Astrophysics
• Masses for Free-Floating Planets and Dwarf Planets
• First simultaneous microlensing observations by two space telescopes: $Spitzer$ & $Swift$ reveal a brown dwarf in event OGLE-2015-BLG-1319
• Measuring microlensing parallax via simultaneous observations from Chinese Space Station Telescope and Roman Telescope
• Microlensing planet detection via geosynchronous and low Earth orbit satellites