Discovery and mass measurements of a cold, 10 Earth mass planet and its host star

Abstract

The discovery and mass measurement of the cold, low-mass planet MOA-2009-BLG-266Lb, performed with the gravitational microlensing method are presented. The planet and host star mass measurements are enabled by the measurement of the microlensing parallax effect, which is seen primarily in the light curve distortion due to the orbital motion of the Earth.

Keywords

• gravitational microlensing
• planet mass measurements
• extrasolar planets