A Roadmap to the Exploration of Rocky Exoplanets

Dr. Avi Mandell | We have entered the era of the discovery of rocky planets orbiting nearby cool red stars, and we will soon be able to begin examining their atmospheres with the James Webb Space Telescope. Similarly, we are on the cusp of beginning the development of a future large telescope to image rocky planets in the habitable zone of the nearest Sun-like stars. This presentation discusses work by the Sellers Exoplanet Environments Collaboration (SEEC) to better understand the diverse range of planetary environments that these missions will reveal, and discusses the NASA exoplanet mission roadmap for exploring the atmospheres and surfaces of our nearest terrestrial neighbors.