# The Multi-site All-Sky CAmeRA: Finding transiting exoplanets around bright ($m_V < 8$) stars

## TL;DR

The MASCARA project is a multi-site observatory designed to detect transiting exoplanets around bright stars by continuously monitoring the entire sky with specialized cameras, providing high-precision light curves for thousands of stars.

## Contribution

This paper introduces the design, deployment, and initial performance of MASCARA, a novel multi-site system for discovering transiting exoplanets around very bright stars.

## Key findings

- Operational since 2015 in the north and 2017 in the south.
- Achieves 1.5% photometric precision per 5 minutes at magnitude 8.
- Will produce light curves for approximately 70,000 stars.

## Abstract

This paper describes the design, operations, and performance of the Multi-site All-Sky CAmeRA (MASCARA). Its primary goal is to find new exoplanets transiting bright stars, $4 < m_V < 8$, by monitoring the full sky. MASCARA consists of one northern station on La Palma, Canary Islands (fully operational since February 2015), one southern station at La Silla Observatory, Chile (operational from early 2017), and a data centre at Leiden Observatory in the Netherlands. Both MASCARA stations are equipped with five interline CCD cameras using wide field lenses (24 mm focal length) with fixed pointings, which together provide coverage down to airmass 3 of the local sky. The interline CCD cameras allow for back-to-back exposures, taken at fixed sidereal times with exposure times of 6.4 sidereal seconds. The exposures are short enough that the motion of stars across the CCD does not exceed one pixel during an integration. Astrometry and photometry are performed on-site, after which the resulting light curves are transferred to Leiden for further analysis. The final MASCARA archive will contain light curves for ${\sim}70,000$ stars down to $m_V=8.4$, with a precision of $1.5\%$ per 5 minutes at $m_V=8$.