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EROS Collaboration

Publications and source records attributed to EROS Collaboration.

6 recordsLinked to original sources

Limits on Galactic Dark Matter with 5 Years of EROS SMC Data

Five years of EROS data towards the Small Magellanic Cloud have been searched for gravitational microlensing events, using a new, more accurate method to assess the impact of stellar blending on the efficiency. Four long-duration candidates have been found which, if they are microlensing events, hint at a non-halo population of lenses. Combined with results from other EROS observation programs, this analysis yields strong limits on the amount of Galactic dark matter made of compact objects. Less than 25% of a standard halo can be composed of objects with a mass between 2 10^-7 Msol and 1 Msol at the 95% C.L.

astro-ph

Not enough stellar Mass Machos in the Galactic Halo

We combine new results from the search for microlensing towards the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) by EROS2 (Experience de Recherche d'Objets Sombres) with limits previously reported by EROS1 and EROS2 towards both Magellanic Clouds. The derived upper limit on the abundance of stellar mass MACHOs rules out such objects as an important component of the Galactic halo if their mass is smaller than 1 solar mass.

astro-ph

Observation of Microlensing towards the Galactic Spiral Arms. EROS II 3 year survey

We present an analysis of the light curves of 9.1 million stars observed during three seasons by EROS (Experience de Recherche d'Objets Sombres), in the Galactic plane away from the bulge. Seven stars exhibit luminosity variations compatible with gravitational microlensing effects due to unseen objects. The corresponding optical depth, averaged over four directions, is tau = 0.45 +0.24 -0.11 x 10^-6. While this value is compatible with expectations from simple galactic models under reasonable assumptions on the target distances, we find an excess of events with short timescale towards the direction closest to the Galactic Centre.

astro-ph

EROS2 microlensing search towards the Magellanic Clouds

EROS2 is a second generation microlensing experiment operating since mid-1996 at the European Southern Observatory (ESO) at La Silla (Chile). We present the two year analysis from our microlensing search towards the Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC) and report on the intensive observation of the caustic crossing event MACHO-SMC-98-1 and the limit derived on t he location of the lens. We also give preliminary results from our search towards the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC); 25 square degrees are being analyzed and two candidates have been found. This allows us to set another limit on the halo mass fraction comprised of compact objects.

astro-ph

Microlensing towards the Small Magellanic Cloud --- EROS 2 two-year analysis

We present the analysis of the first two years of a search for microlensing of stars in the Small Magellanic Cloud with the EROS (Expérience de Recherche d'Objets Sombres) project. A single event is detected, already present in the first year analysis. This low event rate allows us to put new constraints on the fraction of the Galactic Halo mass due to compact objects in the mass range [10^-2, 1] Msol. These limits, along with the fact that the two SMC events observed so far are probably due to SMC deflectors, suggest that LMC and SMC self-lensing may dominate the event rate.

astro-ph