How do scientists discover extrasolar planets?
Particle Physics (IPA)
How is it possible to discover new planets far outside of our solar system? How do astrophysicists track down celestial objects that are thousands or even millions of times fainter than their suns? Professor Hans Martin Schmid from the Institute for Particle Physics and Astrophysics gave members of the Department of Finance of the Canton of Zurich a glimpse into his research.
The Department of Physics was delighted to welcome its guests from the cantonal Department of Finance. Although the two areas — Physics and Finance — are far apart, both work with large numbers and huge amounts of data. In particular, astrophysics is known for its 'astronomical' numbers, for example when it comes to distances to objects that the ETH researchers observe in international cooperations, for example with the top telescopes at the European Southern Observatory (ESO) in Chile. The tax office works with data for tax calculations, and so the visitors were ultimately interested in which research is financed with the taxpayers' money and what that can mean for Switzerland as a business location. Finally, the notion that in the future life might be discovered on extrasolar planets also stimulates new ways of thinking about our earthly life and existence.
The 40 visitors were interested not only in research, but in the entire Hönggerberg campus, which has been extended in recent years to include a number of new buildings. The two guides Irene Odermatt and Franz Radke of ETH Services guided the guests across the campus in perfect weather: from the new student apartments to the roof of the tallest building. From there, the entire area can be seen, where not only very broad basic research in physics is pursued, but also in chemistry, biology, materials science and architecture.