Predictions of the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope Galactic Exoplanet Survey. IV. Lens Mass and Distance Measurements

Abstract As part of the Galactic Bulge Time Domain Survey (GBTDS), the Nancy Grace Roman Galactic Exoplanet Survey (RGES) will use microlensing to discover cold outer planets and free-floating planets not bound to stars. NASA has established several science requirements for the GBTDS to ensure RGES success. A key advantage of RGES is Roman’s high angular resolution, which will allow detection of flux from many host stars. One requirement specifies that Roman must measure the masses and distances of 40% of detected planet hosts with 20% precision or better. To test this, we simulated microlensing events toward the GBTDS fields and used Fisher matrix analysis to estimate light curve parameter uncertainties. Combining these with Roman imaging observables (lens flux and relative lens–source proper motion), we estimated the achievable precision of lens mass and distance measurements. Using pyLIMASS , a publicly available code for estimating lens properties, we applied this analysis to 3000 simulated events. Assuming the A. Cassan et al. exoplanet mass function, we find that ≥40% of host stars meet the required 20% precision threshold, confirming that the GBTDS can satisfy the mission requirement. We validated our approach by comparing our inferred lens masses and distances to empirical measurements from detailed image-constrained light curve modeling of historical microlensing events with Hubble and Keck follow-up imaging. Our results agree within roughly 1 σ , demonstrating that both approaches yield consistent and reliable mass and distance estimates, and confirming the robustness of our simulations for Roman-era microlensing science.