Estimating the science yield of PCS and its synergies with other instruments

The planned Planetary Camera and Spectrograph (PCS) at the ELT will enable the detection and atmospheric characterization of low-mass, low-temperature exoplanets with high-contrast imaging observations. One of the work packages within the PCS R&D roadmap (WP7: Science yield, end-to-end modeling) is devoted to computing yield predictions for the instrument. These computations are a key to understanding the scientific potential of PCS, and the population of exoplanets that it will be able to observe. Yield predictions also allow us to carry out trade-offs during the design phase, quantifying how different performance scenarios would impact the final set of detectable targets. In this talk, we will present the activities of WP7 and some preliminary results already available. On the order of 100 currently known exoplanets are accessible with PCS, and yield estimates based on synthetic populations predict the detection of about two dozen rocky planets in the solar neighborhood, including a handful of potentially Earth-like planets. We will discuss the unique population of exoplanets that PCS will access, as well as the synergies with other instruments for a subset of those targets, which will be excellent cases for atmospheric characterization.