The PLATO Input Catalogue of targets (tPIC) for the first Long Pointing Field

TL;DR

The paper presents the first public release of the PLATO Input Catalogue (tPIC) for the first Long Pointing Field, identifying over 217,000 stars suitable for the ESA PLATO mission's planet detection objectives.

Contribution

It provides a comprehensive star catalog based on Gaia DR3 data, including stellar parameters and interstellar reddening estimates, fulfilling mission science requirements.

Findings

Catalog includes 217,741 stars with detailed parameters.

Median distances are 512 pc for FGK stars and 133 pc for M dwarfs.

Includes stars hosting known exoplanets within the target field.

Abstract

The ESA PLAnetary Transits and Oscillations of stars (PLATO) mission is designed to detect terrestrial planets in the habitable zones of solar-type stars. Owing to telemetry constraints, the selection of PLATO targets must be performed in advance. In this paper, we present the first public release of the PLATO Input Catalogue of targets (tPIC2.2), which provides the list of stars that will be observed during the PLATO first Long-duration Observation Phase field at South (LOPS2) as part of its core science program. We exploit astrometric and photometric data from Gaia Data Release 3 (DR3), together with three-dimensional maps of the local interstellar medium, to identify stars belonging to the PLATO stellar samples as from mission requirements. The tPIC comprises 217,741 stars, including 202,315 FGK dwarfs and subgiants, 15,037 M dwarfs and 789 known planet host stars. The median distances of the samples are 512 pc for FGK stars and 133 pc for M dwarfs. We estimate interstellar reddening for almost all targets and develop an algorithm to infer fundamental stellar parameters (effective temperature, radius, and mass) in an homogeneous way from astrometric and photometric observables. The tPIC fulfills all the science requirements of the PLATO mission. The tPIC also includes a list of stars that host known exoplanets (confirmed or still candidate), located within the LOPS2 field.