Gemini Planet Imager (GPI), a tool that could help find Alien Life, is the world's most advanced instrument to capture the Images of Exoplanets or Extrasolar systems. This instrument has been deployed on one of the world’s biggest telescopes – the eight-metre Gemini South telescope in Chile. This can produce images of Exoplanets almost 10 times better than previous generation of instruments .
When we observe a planet with Kepler telescope , its just detecting the
transit - the attenuation of light - due to the planet passing between
us and the star, but with GPI, We're able to see the planet itself .
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| The Gemini Planet Imager's first-light image. |
How does it Work
- GPI detects infrared radiation from young Jupiter-like planets in wide orbits around other stars, equivalent to the giant planets in our own solar system not long after their formation .
- It does this using Silicon Microchip Deformable Mirrors. By these mirrors it removes atmospheric turbulence, and something known as coronagraphic masks - a telescopic attachment designed to block out the direct light from a star so that nearby objects .
- GPI is an Extreme Adaptive-optics imaging polarimeter/integral-field spectrometer, which will provide diffraction-limited data between 0.9 and 2.4 microns. The system will provide contrast ratios of 10^6 on companions at separations of 0.2-1 arcsecond in a 1-2 hour observation .
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