SPECULOOS
Searching for Earth-sized exoplanets around ultra-cool stars and brown dwarfs.
SPECULOOS (Search for habitable Planets EClipsing ULtra-cOOl Stars) is a project consisting of the SPECULOOS Southern Observatory (SSO) at the Paranal Observatory in Chile and the SPECULOOS Northern Observatory (SNO) at the Teide Observatory in Tenerife. The SSO comprises four Ritchey–Chrétien telescopes of 1-metre primary aperture, each equipped with a NTM-1000 robotic mount, designed to search for Earth-sized exoplanets around ultra-cool stars and brown dwarfs. The project is notable for its focus on ultra-cool dwarf stars and brown dwarfs, which have small radii that cause deeper transits, enabling the detection of terrestrial planets.
- Telescope aperture
- 1 metre
- Number of telescopes sso
- 4
- Number of telescopes sno as of june 2019
- 1
- Location sso
- Paranal Observatory, Chile
- Location sno
- Teide Observatory, Tenerife
- First light europa
- April 2017
- First light artemis
- June 20, 2019
- Lead scientist
- Michaël Gillon of the University of Liège
Lore & Background
The SPECULOOS Southern Observatory consists of four telescopes named Europa, Io, Callisto, and Ganymede, after the Galilean moons of Jupiter. Europa saw first light in April 2017, Io began operations in October 2017, and as of December 2019 all four telescopes were operational. The first telescope for SPECULOOS Northern Observatory, named Artemis, began operations on June 20, 2019. The project is led by Michaël Gillon of the University of Liège and involves scientists from institutions including the University of Liège, University of Birmingham, Cavendish Laboratory Cambridge, University of Bern, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias, and King Abdulaziz University. The European Southern Observatory supports and hosts the SSO at Paranal.
Reader's Guide
SPECULOOS is significant for its targeted search for Earth-sized exoplanets around ultra-cool dwarf stars and brown dwarfs, which are predicted to host common terrestrial planets. The project's continuous observation strategy—each telescope observing one target for about 10 nights—is optimized to find exoplanets in the habitable zone, where transit durations can be as short as 15 minutes. Its legacy includes the discovery of the eclipsing binary brown dwarf 2M1510A, the exoplanet K2-135b, planets around L 98-59, the TOI-178 system, and the 2022 discovery of two super-Earths around LP 890-9 (designated SPECULOOS-2). In 2024, a short-period Earth-sized planet was announced around SPECULOOS-3. The project is complemented by SAINT-EX and TRAPPIST, and its data has helped characterize low-mass eclipsing binaries and rapidly rotating low-mass stars.
Did You Know?
- The name SPECULOOS is a backronym referring to the Belgian spiced biscuit Speculoos.
- The four SSO telescopes are named after Jupiter's Galilean moons: Europa, Io, Callisto, and Ganymede.
- The first light data revealed the eclipsing binary brown dwarf 2M1510A, only the second such object found.
- Each telescope has a 12×12-arcminute field of view and uses an Andor Peltier-cooled 2k × 2k CCD camera.
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