2.4 Microlensing Results
The recent results from the micro-lensing surveys have led to
the construction of new Galactic mass models, with emphasis on
their capability to predict the microlensing rate. The results
from several years of the MACHO survey
(Alcock et al. 1997),
combined with the EROS results
(Renault et al. 1998),
leave little room for
compact objects in the galactic halo with masses in the range of
10-7 to 10-3 M
(cf.
Alcock et al. 1998).
The most likely mass of the handful events detected in
the direction of the Large Magellanic Cloud is about 0.5
M,
which leads to a debate about the real location of the
objects giving rise to the lensing phenomenon : they could belong
to an outlying tidal streamer of the LMC (cf.
Zhao 1998).
Analysis of mass models taking into account a number
of dynamical contraints leads to the result that only a fraction
of the mass in the dark halo of the Galaxy could be made up by
MACHO's (cf.
Alcock et al. 1998).