K2 observes near the ecliptic, where the bulk of Solar System targets lie Jack J. Lissauer NASA Ames K2 Sci Con, Santa Barbara 2015 November 4 Comet Siding Springs Trans-Neptunian Objects Trojan & Hilda Asteroids Main Belt Asteroids Neptune (& Uranus) K2 Solar System Targets Comet C/2013 A1 (Siding Springs) K2 has already observed 5 TNOs, including Pluto Period of light curve gives rotation rate Amplitude of light curve shows asymmetries in shape or albedo Trans-Neptunian Objects K2 has already observed 68 Trojan or Hilda asteroids Period of light curve gives rotation rate Amplitude of light curve shows asymmetries in shape or albedo Trojan & Hilda Asteroids K2 has serendipitously observed ~ 10,000 MBAs that fell into the pixel masks of stars Period of light curve gives rotation rate Amplitude of light curve shows asymmetries in shape or albedo Main Belt Asteroids Amy Simon (NASA GSFC) Jason Rowe (SETI) et al. The Rationale These planets expected to have spherical harmonic oscillations Predicted by Vorontsov (1976), Bercovici & Schubert (1987) Change in radius should change the reflected solar flux (Mosser 1995) and ring structures (Marley & Porco 1993) Detected acoustic modes in Doppler observations of Jupiter (Gaulme 2011) Saturnian oscillations may have been detected via waves observed in Saturns C ring (Hedman & Nicholson 2013) Generate a long duration, rapid cadence, light curve to look for various predicted frequencies Directly applicable to studies of brown dwarfs and exoplanets Challenges Neptune and Uranus saturate detector Use difference imaging photometry to remove background Find disk integrated signal (no photons lost) Periodic thruster firings for RWA desats and telescope roll corrections Can be removed Planetary oscillations give a very faint signal, ~ 2 ppm Neptune Neptune Light Curve Periodograms Keck for Context Hubble for Context Sept. 2015 Atmospheric variability linked to images informs brown dwarf and directly imaged exoplanet analysis Solar oscillations detected within planets light curve Planet oscillations still being searched for Triton & Nereid light curves asteroidal but can be linked to Voyager images Neptune System Science