Earth-like extra-solar planets have luminosities which are many orders of magnitude less than those of their parent star. We propose and test a method for identifying molecular spectral bands in light from such a planet by looking at an offcenter part of an infrared Fourier transform interferogram. This results in superior sensitivity to narrow spectral bands, which are expected in the planet’s spectrum, but are absent in the parent star. We support this by astronomical observations to illustrate the method in the visible. The results suggest that this method is applicable to searches for planet biolines, and for differentiating between narrow lines and wide lines in other astronomical scenarios.

Date Published: 24 July 2014
PDF: 6 pages
Proc. SPIE 9146, Optical and Infrared Interferometry IV, 91460B (24 July 2014); doi: 10.1117/12.2057372

Published in SPIE Proceedings Vol. 9146:
Optical and Infrared Interferometry IV
Jayadev K. Rajagopal; Michelle J. Creech-Eakman; Fabien Malbet, Editor(s)