A Laboratory for Innovation in Opto-Mechanics (LIOM) Project
Exo-life Finder
A telescope designed to search for life on planets beyond our solar system.
Are we alone?
Are we close to finding life beyond Earth, or is our planet truly one of a kind? The ELF project’s powerful imaging technology could soon answer this big question, changing how we see our place in the universe and challenging our beliefs about life itself.
Why ELF?
ELF will be the world's largest optical telescope with enhanced sensitivity. A special technique called Fizeau interferometry, where separate mirrors move independently to capture clear, high-contrast images of distant exoplanets.
Our team of scientists and engineers is from around the world
Imaging Surfaces of Exoplanets
Seeing oceans, continents, quasi-static weather, and other surface features on exoplanets may allow for detecting
and characterizing life outside the solar system.
Exoplanet Image Surfacing
The Proxima b exoplanet resides within the stellar habitable zone, possibly allowing for liquid water on its surface, as on Earth. However, even the largest planned telescopes will not be able to resolve its surface features directly. We employ an inversion technique to indirectly image exoplanet surfaces using observed unresolved reflected light variations over the course of the exoplanet’s orbital and axial rotation: ExoPlanet Surface Imaging
Relative Brightness Light Curve
The solid red line light curve is the best-fit model corresponding to the recovered map. The error bars of the simulated data are smaller than the symbol size.
Exoplanet Image Surfacing
Original map. The original map is used to simulate the “observed” light curve (blue symbols in the relative brightness light ).
Recovered Map A
Recovered Map B